


It Starts Like This

by LadyDae



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anakin Skywalker Doesn't Turn to the Dark Side, Anakin Skywalker Has Issues, Anakin Skywalker Leaves the Jedi Order, Anakin Skywalker Needs a Hug, Canon Divergence - Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Character Study, Eventual Romance, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Padmé Amidala Lives, Past Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Romance, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-25
Packaged: 2021-03-27 07:35:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30119367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyDae/pseuds/LadyDae
Summary: Anakin Skywalker fell to the dark side, became Darth Vader, and immediately betrayed his new Sith Master. He ended the Clone Wars, saved the Republic, walked away from the Jedi Order, and kept his sins secret. Now, he has to figure out what's next and who he is if not a Jedi.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Anakin Skywalker/Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Padmé Amidala & Anakin Skywalker, Past Padme Amidala/Anakin Skywalker - Relationship
Comments: 123
Kudos: 191





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> So... this is decidedly not You're Cordially invited, but I'll be done with that and have it posted by the end of April... Early May at the latest. Until then, enjoy this short story that was supposed to be a 8k word one-shot and ended up 21k words that I decided to post in four parts. It was supposed to be from multiple points of view of a bunch of scenes that explored a "what-if" after the war, but it ended up more of an Anakin Skywalker character study. It's not as thought out and thorough as my other stories, but it's not intended to be. Also, it's not beta'd. So there may be a couple of typos that Grammarly didn't catch and that I missed when I went over it that I'll eventually find and fix. Either way. Enjoy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Anakin Skywalker loses his way...

It ends like this.

“Ani, we need to talk.”

A small part of him knew that was true. Had known it for weeks. A bigger part of him reminded himself that he finally had everything he wanted. Padmé. Their children. Free from being a Jedi. And he’d be able to live out the rest of his days just like this. That same part of him thought that if they just avoided talking, this issue—whatever the issue was—would pass. He just had to give it enough time. He just needed to get used to… this.

He decided to play dumb.

“About what?”

Padmé gave a patient sigh, “Please, Ani. Don’t make this hard. I want this to be easy for the both of us.”

Anakin wanted to make it difficult. Anakin wanted to rage and fight and accuse her of giving up on them. But he’d had enough of that.

“It’s just that these last few months have really shown me some things about us.”

“Last few months” was code for the debacle with Palpatine. And things about “us” were things about him. Namely, that Anakin had the potential to become someone’s raging, homicidal lap dog with the right words and motivation. Well. Actually. No one really knew that. But he could admit that those last couple of weeks of Padmé’s pregnancy, he hadn’t been the best or most supportive husband. Starting with his staunch support of Palpatine when she’d been trying to get him to hear that something was wrong.

As though reading his thoughts, Padmé shook her head, “That’s not to say I fault you for what happened with Palpatine. It wasn’t your fault. He tricked all of us.”

That’s what everyone kept saying. That they’d all been tricked. But Anakin didn’t feel like there was any trick involved. Palpatine told him he was the Sith Lord, and instead of killing him where he stood, Anakin only got four Jedi Masters killed and barely missed consolidating his place as the man’s apprentice. If not for that one moment, that split second where he actually registered what Palpatine was promising…

_To cheat death is a power only one has achieved, but if we work together, I know we can discover the secret._

Palpatine told him he knew the power. Told him he would help save Padmé’s life. But if after all this time, if he learned everything his master taught him and he still hadn’t known… And in his typical haste, he snarled and impaled his new master, taking Palpatine by surprise as he’d risen from his christening as Darth Vader.

Sure. A trick.

Anakin had known exactly what he was about to do.

“But Ani, you’re miserable. And you have been for a long time. I used to think it was just being a Jedi and the war that was causing the issue. That being forced to keep our relationship secret was causing the problem. But I think it’s more than that. I think you need more that I’m able to give you.”

He might have had enough of all the rage and darkness, but in that moment, he briefly gave into it.

“Because my issues are more than you want to deal with. Because a lost former Jedi war hero who may or may not have outright murdered the Chancellor but only got away with it because yeah, he actually was committing treason, is a stain on your perfect, lavish life,” he accused, curling his right hand on his knee.

“Anakin. No,” Padmé said, heedlessly taking his right hand in hers. A surprisingly intimate gesture for someone that was in the process of breaking up with him. “I want you to find happiness, even if it’s not with me. You’re young. We both are. Better to move on now while we still care than to end up bitter and hurt each other worse. And who knows. Maybe in the future, we’ll be in a better place to be what the other needs.”

Anakin wasn’t sure he agreed with that. Months ago, he might have argued with her. But he was tired of fighting. Besides, it had taken a fair amount of effort to get the twins down for a nap. Wouldn’t want to wake them.

“Maybe,” he ended up saying half-heartedly.

* * *

In the dramatic holodramas that Anakin would never admit to watching, breakups were always messy and dramatic with a lot of yelling, sobbing, and accusations of betrayal.

His and Padmé’s was none of that.

Being the helpful person that she tended to be, she not only gave him time to figure out where he was going to go but also helped him figure it out. Much as he’d never particularly felt like Coruscant itself was home, he had nowhere else to go, and it made sense to stick around as long as Padmé was in the Senate to make whatever custody arrangement they came up with for the twins easier.

It took a month of assessing his options, but finally, he settled on a “career path.” That’s what Padmé called it, anyway. She’d initially suggested that he could go into security. A lot of high-profile, wealthy people would jump at the chance to have a former high-profile Jedi war vet on their security team. Hell, they might even put him in charge of their security team. Anakin decided against that. He’d had enough violence and fighting for a lifetime. But finally, he decided on engineering and mechanics since he was good at it. And who knew Jedi training and temple classes counted as enough certification in lieu of an actual engineering degree? Though, Anakin suspected that was Padmé pulling strings.

They’d found him a nice apartment that he’d be able to afford on his own… eventually. Once he got his first paycheck, that was. Until then, Padmé was also graciously paying the rent for the first three months and to furnish it.

 _“I’m going to be the one to end up paying alimony anyway,”_ she’d said with a playful roll of her eyes.

It felt a lot like she was trying to hurry him up and out her life. If Palpatine were still alive, Anakin might have mentioned it to his former mentor, and the old man might have validated Anakin’s doubts. But Palpatine wasn’t there to validate his doubts. Anakin had made sure of that. Besides, even without the Force, Anakin knew Padmé was only trying to help. That’s just how she was. She’d give the clothes off her back to help someone in need. And she had once. On some planet and mission that Anakin didn’t remember the details of. Taking off her warm and expensive cloak to give to a shivering woman whose world was ravaged by the war along with the credits in a hidden pocket. To think anything else of Padmé was just Anakin’s own demons talking. And he’d almost done that once to nearly catastrophic results.

His new apartment was nowhere near as nice as Padmé’s senatorial luxury apartment at 500 Republica. But it suited his needs and was big enough for the twins to spend nights when they were older. For now, they would remain with Padmé, who was let him spend time with them whenever he wanted. The handmaidens would let him in. Unless she told him otherwise in advance.

But until the twins were old enough to spend a night away from their mother, until he was settled enough to keep them on his own, the place felt… empty. And not just because the rest of the furniture wouldn’t be there until next week.

A knock on the door. He hoped it wasn’t maintenance. He’d told them he could fix the leaky faucet himself. Whenever he found his toolbox. It’s not like he’d accumulated much since leaving the temple. He had to be overlooking it…

“Ahsoka,” he said upon opening the door and finding the young togruta woman at the door.

“Hey, Skyguy,” she chimed.

They were both silent.

Finally, Ahsoka looked away and then back him with a small smile.

“Heard you got a new place. I also heard that it’s customary to bring food to warm the house.”

Anakin looked down at the covered tray in her hands.

“I really hope you didn’t cook that,” he said.

“Ha, ha,” she replied dryly as he let her in. Then she added, “Padmé helped me order something you liked to bring over.”

So that’s how Ahsoka found him.

He led her to the kitchen, where she set the tray on the counter.

“Nice place,” she commented. “Huge upgrade. At least from the Jedi Temple. Probably a downgrade from Padmé’s apartment.”

Anakin shrugged. “It’s nice enough.” A pause. “Want the grand tour?”

She shrugged in response and followed him. As far as Anakin was concerned, there wasn’t much to see. He hadn’t even known what to look for when choosing an apartment. This had all been Padmé. But it filled the silence, if not the chilly distance between him and Ahsoka.

He hadn’t seen her all this time. Not since Mandalore. According to Master Yoda, she’d been trying to get in contact with him after she captured Maul. He’d meant to call her back. But then everything with Palpatine happened, and then he’d been kept in holding for days until they finally got proof that Anakin hadn’t been lying about Palpatine being the Sith orchestrating both sides of the war. Then Padmé had the babies, and Obi-wan told him Ahsoka had volunteered for a mission to round up the Separatist Council after the Separatists fell apart without Palpatine’s guiding hand and time just… got away and four months had gone by. So to say he was a little confused by her sudden appearance was accurate. If not an understatement.

Last time he’d seen her, she’d been keeping her distance. And as far as he knew, she hadn’t sought him out after that last time she tried. So Anakin wasn’t sure why she was here. Had Padmé or Obi-wan reached out to her and sent her here, and she’d come out of pity? Was she just being polite? Why was she here? Why would anyone want to be near him after—

“You are projecting,” Ahsoka suddenly said, interrupting his tour of the third bedroom. “Badly.”

That set him off.

“Well, I’m not a Jedi anymore. So I don’t have to bottle up my feelings and pretend I’m some unfeeling,” he paused to search for the right word, “ _thing_ anymore,” he finished snapping.

“I wasn’t saying you had to. I was just pointing it out. I was trying to…”

“To do what? Why are you here, Ahsoka?”

He punctuated his question with a jerky wave of his hand that might have made anyone else flinch back. Ahsoka didn’t, but she did cast her eyes guiltily to the floor.

Fuck.

“I’m sorry,” he said simultaneously with her. Then, “Wait. What are you sorry about? I’m the one that snapped at you for no reason.”

“Yeah, but you’re right to be mad, especially after I practically ghosted you for the last four months.”

“No. I could have reached out.”

“How would you have known to after the cold shoulder I gave you last time I saw you?”

“But that’s the thing. I did know. Master Yoda told me, and I just…” Anakin sighed. “There was a lot going on.”

Ahsoka rolled her eyes. “Tell me about it.”

“Over dinner?” Anakin suggested.

“I hope you’ve at least got dinnerware. Because I forgot to ask for disposables when I picked it up.”

Turned out that Anakin did have dinnerware. He was sure Padmé was somehow responsible for that.

“So. Tell me everything,” Ahsoka said as they sat at the counter on stools that Padmé called “modern but timeless.”

At her prompting, Anakin was struck by the fact that he didn’t know where to start, and though she requested it, he probably wasn’t going to tell her everything. He vaguely explained the circumstances around how he discovered Palpatine was the Sith Lord. Starting with killing Dooku, then with being appointed to the Council as Palpatine’s representative (to which Ahsoka aptly surmised that Palpatine wanted Anakin to spy on the Council, which Anakin hadn’t considered that way) to the Council outright asking him to spy on Palpatine (and now Anakin felt even guiltier and dumber for snapping at Obi-wan and resenting the Council for it since Palpatine had asked the same) to finding out Palpatine was the Sith Lord. He didn’t tell her about the visions of Padmé dying in childbirth. He didn’t tell her that Palpatine offered to help him. He didn’t tell her that he’d initially taken him up on it. Even gotten his Sith name. Darth Vader. And if not for a split second of doubt…

“Wait. How exactly did you find out Palpatine was the Sith?”

Ahsoka. Always sharp and observant. Anakin had never been able to get much past her. He didn’t know why he’d thought that changed.

“He told me,” Anakin finally admitted.

“Why would Palpatine tell you he was the Sith?”

“Because he wanted me to join him.”

“That’s why he let you kill Dooku,” Ahsoka surmised. Then she frowned, brow furrowing. “Wait, why would he think you’d join him?”

“I don’t know,” Anakin snapped. Then he sighed and said, “Padmé and I are getting a divorce.”

Ahsoka remained silent, brow still furrowed. For a moment, Anakin thought she wasn’t going to let him get away with moving on from talking about Palpatine without giving her details and started to continue before she could call him out.

“She told me when I stopped by today,” Ahsoka finally replied, graciously allowing the abrupt change in subject. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. I think… I don’t know. Maybe it was a long time coming. I’ve been a miserable mess for a long time, and Padmé doesn’t think she’s helping, and maybe she’s right.”

“Well, you got cute babies out of it. Padmé forced me to hold them both. Said she’d been waiting for me to come by so she could introduce them to their aunt.”

Anakin smiled a little. “Well, she’s right.”

Ahsoka shook her head. “Never did anything by halves.”

“But enough about my pathetic tragedy of a life. What about you?” Anakin asked.

Ahsoka shrugged. “Oh. You know. Apprehended Maul, been on a few war cleanup missions since. That kind of thing.”

“I’m sure it was much more adventurous than that. Give me details.”

She did. Starting from the initial siege to Maul luring them into a trap, to him disappearing and then reappearing afterward, to when she beat him in their duel.

“Did you ever find out why he was there before you turned him over to the Council?”

Ahsoka shrugged. “Not really. Just that he was expecting Obi-wan and you would show up instead. He was pretty certain he could have bested you in a duel too.”

Anakin managed a laugh at that. “He couldn’t even best you—no offense.”

She grinned. “None taken. I told Maul pretty much the same thing.”

They fell back into silence again. This time not like the awkward and distant one from earlier but not quite all the way comfortable either.

“I should probably let you go,” Anakin finally said. “You probably have other things to do. I’m glad you came by, though.”

“Trying to get rid of me already?”

“No. No. Just…” He paused. “I’m just sure you’re busy. You’ve always been good at finding something to do.”

“That’s true. But it’s not like I’m going anywhere. I mean… whenever the Council sends me off-world for a mission or something but—”

“The Council? You rejoined the Order?”

“Oh. Right. That happened too. I thought… I thought Obi-wan would have told you.”

“He probably thought you would have wanted to tell me.”

“I did,” Ahsoka rushed out. “I wanted you to be at the knighting, but… you had just left, and I wasn’t sure—”

“Relax, Snips. I wasn’t trying to accuse you of anything.”

She suddenly seemed to find her half-empty plate interesting as she said, “I guess… I guess I’m saying that I’ll be around.” A pause. “If you want me to be.”

Anakin gave a small smile. “I think I’d like that.”

* * *

Perhaps it shouldn’t have been particularly shocking that going from being a Jedi and on the front lines of war as a general made Anakin’s new life comparatively more mundane. He should be grateful. This was what he wanted. To settle down so he could be with this family. To have the luxury of going to work and coming home without having to worry about some catastrophe that would take him away for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. This is what he’d dreamed of. This is what had gotten him through on the roughest days during the war. There were a lot of people who would kill for the opportunity and stability he had right now. This was more than a former slave from Tatooine could have dreamed of. But it still… It didn’t feel like enough. It wasn’t what he thought it would be.

“Can I ask you something?” He added, “About after you left.”

True to her word, Ahsoka managed to hang around. Sometimes with Obi-wan. Sometimes with Obi-wan _and_ Rex. But the three were rarely ever available at the same time. They led much busier lives than he did.

“What about it?” No clarification was needed. There was only one time she’d actually _left_.

“Did you…?” Anakin trailed off. When he was ready to talk again, he had to stop Leia from hitting Luke.

Once they’d turned six months, Padmé became comfortable with him keeping them over the weekend. Not that she hadn’t been comfortable before. According to her, their nanny always joked about feeling bad that she essentially got paid to do nothing the days Anakin came to visit the twins. Because he always tended to whatever they needed. Anakin hadn’t been sure how to take the comment. What had she expected? He visited his children to be part of their lives and take care of them. Why wouldn’t he? Eventually, he decided she’d only meant it as a compliment. But regardless, it had taken a while for him to get settled into his new life.

Leia wasn’t happy about Anakin’s intervention and hit him instead.

“Young lady,” Anakin said sternly, matching Leia’s scowl.

After a few seconds, Leia burst into tears. And then Luke.

Anakin sighed.

“I’ll take one,” Ahsoka offered.

“You’re not here to babysit.”

Ahsoka ignored him and picked up Luke while Anakin grabbed Leia. Luke promptly stopped crying, preoccupied with playing with one of Ahsoka’s lekku. Anakin was sure there was something very intimate and personal about togruta lekku and that it was improper to touch and play with a togruta’s lekku. But Ahsoka didn’t seem bothered by it with Luke. She would have stopped him if she was.

“But did I what?” Ahsoka asked over Leia’s continued whimpers.

“Did you feel like you were without purpose anymore? Like… like your existence suddenly didn’t mean anything.”

When he’d tried to broach this topic with Padmé when she’d been home while he visited the twins, she immediately assumed he was having suicidal thoughts. It had taken the rest of the visit to convince her otherwise, and he hadn’t tried to broach the topic again. He’d thought about asking Obi-wan too. But though Anakin knew he’d considered walking away from the Jedi a few times, he hadn’t actually done it.

Ahsoka had. She’d gone back, but she’d actually left.

“I knew it meant something. I knew I had a place somewhere. I just wasn’t sure it was with the Jedi. Sometimes I’m still not sure,” Ahsoka admitted. “But I feel like to do the things I want to do to help, the Order is where I need to be.” Then, “Don’t like the job?”

“No. I do, actually.”

And really. Anakin did. For the first time in… well, ever, he felt like his skills were being appreciated. His perfectionist tendencies, his will to do the impossible even when it came to just feats of engineering practically had his supervisors and managers worshiping the ground he walked. And when he made mistakes, they were quickly forgotten because of the work he did overall. They were never thrown back up in his face. For the first time in his life, he didn’t feel like he had to be on guard all the time. Constantly ready to defend himself from unfair and impossible expectations even when he tried his hardest to meet them. For the first time, he felt like he was enough for someone.

“It just… I feel like I could be doing more.”

“More what?”

“I don’t know. That’s the problem. That’s why I feel like I’m just mindlessly existing right now.”

Luke was nodding sleepily while still grasping one of Ahsoka’s lekku. Ahsoka shifted him to lie in her lap and gently rubbed his back.

“I think that’s probably something you’re going to have to figure out on your own,” she finally replied. “I wish I could give you a more helpful answer than that, but that’s what I had to do. And I’m still figuring things out.”

Anakin sighed. “I guess.”

“You just have to give it time.”

Ahsoka’s comm vibrated. She gave it a quick glance before silencing it.

“Jedi business?” Anakin asked.

“No. Just a friend confirming plans later tonight.”

“A friend, huh?”

Ahsoka rolled her eyes. “You’re reading into nothing.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You are.”

Anakin would admit he could be tragically oblivious on the best of days when it came to people. But he hadn’t been oblivious to this new friend Ahsoka seemed to be spending a lot of time with. A friend she seemed reluctant to give any details about. Not to mention he spent three years calling Padmé just a friend when they had decidedly _not_ been just friends. At the time, anyway.

“You don’t have to hide him. Or her.” He paused. “Them?”

“Her. And it’s nothing serious.”

“But it is something? You should bring her by.”

Ahsoka scoffed. “So you can scare her off. Nice try, Skyguy. I don’t answer to you anymore.”

Anakin was aware. Almost a year away, and suddenly she’d gone from his teenage padawan to a confident young woman. Anakin couldn’t even take partial credit for it. Not when he’d come out of all this such a mess.

“Look at you. Breaking the rules and going behind the Council’s back without my encouragement.”

“It’s not behind their back. Not really.”

Anakin raised an eyebrow in askance.

“I mean… no attachments is technically still a rule. But a group of us have decided to interpret it much more loosely is all,” Ahsoka gave.

“A group?”

“Not like an organized rebellion or anything. We’re still Jedi first, just… we’re living our lives while doing it. Helps that I’m pretty sure Master Secura is all but openly dating her clone commander. And they gave her a Council seat after you left.”

Anakin had heard. About the Council appointment. Not Secura and her commander. That was new.

“She still has to be discreet about it with fraternization rules, and the status of the clones still… unclear. But people know about it. I think the Council knows about it. They just don’t say anything. As long as we aren’t turning to the dark side en masse,” Ahsoka added.

“Who knew those old heads would actually be encouraging change?”

“I wouldn’t go as far as encouraging. They still don’t like it. They just aren’t doing anything about it. Not after the war.”

The war had changed a lot of things—most of them for the worse. But maybe the evolution of the Jedi was a good thing to come out of it. Even if the war had been devastating. Maybe even because the war had been so devastating.

“You know. If you wanted to, I’m sure they’d take you back. They owe you.”

Anakin made himself busy running his hands through Leia’s brown hair.

Sure. Owed him for deciding at the last minute not to betray and help Sidious decimate them. All in exchange for saving Padmé and his unborn children from certain death. The certainty of which had disappeared after killing Palpatine. He could have attributed it all to Palpatine. That Palpatine somehow managed to get past his shield and cause the dreams. But the Force confirmed the truth about that. The vision had been real. Anakin might have been manipulated by the Sith all along, but he wasn’t _that_ weak-minded. Palpatine hadn’t had that much power over him. Somehow, Anakin changed the visions. He just didn’t know how.

But the Jedi Council didn’t know all that. He’d done a lot of dumb things, but he hadn’t been dumb enough to tell what remained of the Council that he helped Palpatine kill Windu. That he had accepted Palpatine’s offer and turned to the dark side, no matter how brief. Because that was just asking for them to detain him for the rest of his life.

And meaningless as he felt his existence was, he did enjoy his freedom. Besides, he didn’t want to be a Jedi anymore. That much, he was sure. He would continue to keep as much distance as possible between himself and the Jedi Order. Two of his closest friends being Jedi aside.

“I’ll pass,” he finally answered. “We should get the twins to bed.”

It was after they’d put the twins to bed, lying side by side in their crib because they refused to sleep separately, that Ahsoka gave one more opinion on Anakin’s dilemma.

“You know. I bet to the two of them, outside of Padmé, you mean everything.”

Maybe that was true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading. And thanks in advance for the kudos, comments and subscriptions.


	2. Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Anakin is still lost but manages to do something good...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 100 kudos for one chapter!!! You guys are the absolute best! I'm cranking out the chapters as fast as I can edit them, but since this isn't beta'd, I'm taking more time than it normally would. Thanks again for all the love!

Anakin eventually fell into a rhythm he could tolerate. Go to work. Take care of the twins when it was his week to have them. Have a nightly existential crisis.

It was all going so well.

Until the first anniversary of the war ending.

The official end of the war was months after the day that Anakin put his lightsaber through Palpatine. But he was credited as being the catalyst for the ending of the war as it pretty much just fell apart afterward. With all their leaders dead and the puppet master of it all exposed, there hadn’t been a point to fighting anymore. Most Separatist planets were left with little choice but to grudgingly return to the Republic.

He was an esteemed guest of honor at a gala celebrating the Republic’s success, where he had to sit for hours and look like he cared as Senators gave rousing (boring) speeches about how they overcame adversity and an internal conspiracy to destroy the peace, stability, and freedom that the Republic represented. Senators who had done nothing but sit on their asses and argue over how the war was affecting their pockets as they used the army and the Jedi as fodder while never making any real sacrifices. Senators who he’d almost fucked over to help Palpatine in his takeover. Senators who would have deserved it.

No. Corrupt and slimy and as unable to agree on anything meaningful as the Senate was, even after the Republic _just_ missed total collapse, they wouldn’t have deserved what Palpatine had in store for them. Maybe.

Anakin made sure to hold his wine glass in his left hand all night.

Even now, though, he had to put all his focus into not holding the glass too tightly. Which was also good because it distracted him from the fact that he wanted to punch this Senator in the face. An urge that he’d been fighting for many of the dozens of Senators trying to cozy up to him tonight and congratulate him on his monumental service and sacrifice.

He wished Padmé were standing with him to make this all better. He’d seen her earlier before she was pulled away and then went to make her own rounds around the room. But he couldn’t keep depending on her like that. It was bad enough that she went through so much trouble to make their separation so easy for him. Was patient as he tried to gain his bearings and learn to take care of himself without the backing of an entire institution behind him for the first time in his life. He had to learn to stand on his own at some point.

“Knight Skywalker,” Ahsoka said, suddenly appearing at his left side. “I’ve been trying to catch you all evening, but you’ve been rather popular, to say the least.”

“Not a Jedi anymore, Knight Tano,” Anakin said.

Ahsoka rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to be so formal, and you know it.” Then she turned to the senator. “I’m sorry. It’s just been a while since I’ve had a chance to catch up with my old master.”

Sure. A while if a while meant the past weekend.

“Oh, no apologies needed. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do with quite a few people of my own tonight.”

The woman finally left, and Anakin let out a sigh of relief, tension he hadn’t noticed he was carrying leaving his shoulders.

“Thanks for the save,” Anakin said, gulping back the last of his wine.

“No problem.”

Anakin sat the glass down on a random table.

“How long until it won’t be seen as rude for me to leave?” he asked.

Ahsoka shrugged. “How should I know? I’m just the security.”

“You captured Maul. This is as much for you as it is for me.”

“Which was more or less a personal favor that didn’t impact the war, technically started another unauthorized war, and that I did when I was still a civilian. Something that the Council wasn’t trying to draw attention to.”

“You helped round up the Separatist Council off Mustafar.”

“Hadn’t officially rejoined the Order at that point.”

“You just didn’t want a bunch of Senators crowding around you for a photo op with recognized galactic heroes.”

“You know me so well.”

At this point, Anakin noticed that Ahsoka was leading them out the grand ballroom and into the decorative hallway. A few people were milling about, but not many. The two were able to find a spot on a plush bench not too far away. He couldn’t quite leave yet, but this was enough for now.

“Too many people?” Ahsoka asked.

“Sort of.”

Ahsoka didn’t reply. Anakin took it as a sign to continue.

“It’s just hard to be in there with all those people congratulating me and honoring my sacrifice. But I’m not exactly sure what I sacrificed for.”

“What do you mean?”

“I just… I don’t know. I feel like I did all this fighting for nothing.”

“Why did you think you were doing it? What did you think would happen?”

That the galaxy would be a better place? Because it was the war that was responsible for every bad thing that suddenly slipped under the Republic’s radar. Slavery, corruption, the pointless squabbling, and deliberation, not doing anything that actually benefitted people and kept them safe. He’d thought once he killed Palpatine, once it was revealed that he was behind everything, that the problems would go away. Except they hadn’t.

The Senate argued for months about what to do with the clones before deciding to stand up to the Kaminoans and grant them citizenship. But that was taking forever, according to Rex. Then there was debate about which war-torn planets were going to get aid first and if some of them should get any at all, much to Padmé’s frustration. And there was only so much the Jedi could do to help because at the end of the day, for all their preaching of neutrality and being unbiased mediators, they were the lapdogs to the Republic. Not to mention, they were still stretched thin. If they wanted to honor his sacrifice, maybe they could _do_ something about all that instead of smiling in his face for photo ops all night.

And sometimes, seeing all this, seeing all these senators and diplomats act like there was nothing fucking wrong, Anakin wondered if Palpatine had really been the problem. If he’d done the right thing in turning on the Sith just seconds after he pledged himself to the man. If anything Palpatine had planned would have been much worse than… than _this_.

“I guess I just thought things would be better. And they’re not. And I can’t do anything about it.”

“Why can’t you?” Ahsoka asked.

“Because I’m only one person. And no one will listen to me. I’m just the ex-Jedi from a backwater planet who knows nothing about how the galaxy works and is only good for a fight,” Anakin sighed. He should have taken another glass of wine. “Or at least, I used to be.”

They sat in silence for a long time, watching other guests from the gala walk to and from the ballroom. Even if Ahsoka didn’t have an answer, it felt good to get that out to someone.

“Then show them you’re more than that. Prove them wrong,” A pause. “It’s what you would have told me when I was your padawan.”

He would have. Back then. But he wasn’t that person anymore.

Still.

* * *

Despite feeling like a wholly different person than the one that trained a padawan part of the way to knighthood (Ahsoka would argue that it was all the way to knighthood), Anakin decided even _if_ there was nothing he could do about anything, he could stay informed. Find out what was going on outside the bubble of information he got from living in the Core. News and information were very different closer to and in the outer rim. A lot less filtered in some ways.

So he called Beru.

She was as shocked to hear from him as he was that he managed to talk himself into calling his step-brother’s girlfriend.

“Anakin,” she finally said.

“Hey.” A pause. “You said I could call. Any time. And I—”

“I meant it. I just didn’t expect you would.”

Of course, she didn’t. Big shot Jedi from the Core that he’d been. Jedi didn’t do their good deeds and philanthropy on a backwater Hutt planet. Anakin had just gotten lucky that a Jedi found him and plucked him out of slave life. Not to mention, the last and only time Beru had seen him, Anakin had done little more than mope around and cry over the passing of his mother. The only thing he had done was take her aside to make sure that his mother had actually been free and happy. That Cliegg Lars hadn’t been like the men that were all too common on Tatooine. Who found a pretty slave woman they liked and “freed” her to make her his wife. That his mother hadn’t been there by force. Beru was the only one he could trust to give him that answer. He’d never met her, but he knew of her family. She was a descendant of a long line of Tatooine slaves herself. The Whitesuns. She would know if his mother had only traded a harsher form of slavery for something more comfortable.

 _“They’re good people,”_ Beru assured him. _“It wasn’t like that. She was free. And she was happy. She just missed you.”_

She’d given him the comm code before they left. Anakin took it but didn’t think he’d ever used it. He certainly didn’t think he’d get through to Beru on the first try. Long-range communication on Tatooine was sketchy at best. Sandstorms frequently knocked out long-range communications on the planet. If the long-range communication wasn’t offline for whatever reason, to begin with.

“Is anything wrong?”

Anakin almost laughed. The girl who had never left Tatooine asking him, the Jedi, living in his comfy, climate-controlled Core apartment if anything was wrong.

“Not really. I just called to… catch up. I guess.” At her skeptical look, Anakin added, “I don’t know. See what was going on. Connect back to my roots,” Anakin added sardonically and with a roll of his eyes.

For whatever reason, Beru took pity on him.

She informed him that she and his step-brother, Owen, had gotten married. That Cliegg died not long after the beginning of the Clone Wars and was buried next to his mother. That the war hadn’t affected them too badly. And in some ways, the extra traffic through the trade lanes helped with some things. She’d been vague about what those some things were, but Anakin knew.

“Like with helping smuggle runaway slaves off-planet and away from the Hutts?” he asked bluntly.

Beru didn’t answer, eyes narrowing. Anakin understood the suspicion. He may have at one time been one of them, but he’d long since distanced himself from his home planet. Married a Senator, became a Jedi, and thought he’d be able to help fix everything. Only to have been complicit in making things worse and willing to make things so much worse in exchange for a promise Anakin more and more was sure couldn’t have been delivered to him anyway.

“I want to help. I want to actually do something. I know I can’t do much. I have kids now. They’re not even a year. But I need to do something. I’ve got connections with people still. Even though I’m not a Jedi anymore. I can—”

“Papers,” Beru said.

“Papers?”

“It’s one thing getting people off-planet, but getting the necessary paperwork to make them Republic citizens is tricky. Without it, they can’t do anything. Sometimes, they even get sent back into slavery without them. We try to get them as quick as we can, but it’s hard. Our people have to be careful. Sometimes the paperwork gets backed up for months.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Anakin assured.

He went to Padmé first. Anakin was still trying to figure out how often was appropriate to contact your ex-wife, who you amicably split with, when it wasn’t to discuss when he was coming to pick up the twins or something. He didn’t want to seem clingy or possessive or like he was angling to get her back. But he figured asking her about getting papers to legally reside in the Republic was okay.

Padmé sighed at his question. “It’s really tricky. Technically, because of the Republic’s treaty with hutts and criminal overlords like Jabba to use their trade lanes during the war, we’re supposed to deport them back to the planets they ran from. The Senate’s not very interested in repealing that right now.”

Anakin thought he’d been getting better at not losing his temper and taking it out on whoever was the most convenient target. He failed. Railing over how the Republic may as well legalize slavery if that’s what they were going to do. That this was the problem with the Republic. Argue all day and for months over what to do with the clones, but being complicit in slavery? Totally fine, though the Senate certainly wouldn’t argue it that way, according to Padmé. This was the government that the Jedi decided to pledge their allegiance to, all the while calling themselves neutral mediators and peacekeepers. And once again, though he didn’t voice this, he wondered if he should have just let Sidious destroy them all before he turned on and killed the man.

Padmé tried and failed to calm him. And then he cruelly accused her of being the same as all the other corrupt politicians and disconnected before she could reply.

He called back a few hours later to apologize. Force. No wonder she’d divorced him. He hadn’t meant to get so angry. He just… sometimes he couldn’t control it.

“You can’t keep bottling up your anger and then taking it out on people who are on your side Anakin,” Padmé said firmly. “And I know I didn’t always listen to you. Or try to understand your point of view. And that I contributed to that anger. But if you don’t get it under control, you’re going to push away the people you do have. They won’t put up with it forever.”

“I know. I know. I just… It’s hard, Padmé.”

Because really, he wasn’t angry at anyone but himself. And he wasn’t sure why or how not to be.

Padmé gave a small smile. “I know, Ani. But if anyone can overcome it, it’s you.”

* * *

It was easier to solve the Republic citizenship papers issue than to solve the issues of his anger problems. Anakin would get to the latter. He would. But he could mostly manage that, and he’d promised Beru he’d get back to her as soon as he could.

He mentioned it to Ahsoka. Not particularly looking for an answer. Just making general conversation about his new endeavor while standing in the corner of Padmé’s living room and watching the twins enjoy the wonders of cake for their first birthday.

“I think I can help you with that,” she said quietly.

Anakin looked over to where Padmé’s family was gushing over the twins and in the middle of a debate about some politics or the other. Obi-wan had been dragged into it somehow. Anakin learned long ago that it was just better not to get involved in Naberrie political debates. It was always intense. It would have been worse if Padmé’s nieces were here. Pooja was a fireball who would turn bright red with passion while arguing a point.

Sure they were occupied, he asked, “How?”

“You know, they finally passed that bill to make the clones citizens.”

“Yeah. I heard. Rex was telling me about it.”

“Yeah. I was talking about it with the boys. They’re excited about it, but they still have to get all the paperwork together to get them their legal papers and their documents. And because no one really cared to keep count beyond making sure there were enough bodies to fight in the war, they’re not sure exactly how many clones we actually have. You know, between the MIA and the deserters and the uncertain death toll. And the Kaminoans aren’t talking after they were implicated in Palpatine’s plot,” Ahsoka explained.

“What does this have to do with my problem?”

She raised an eye marking at him and gave him a cross look.

“I’m getting there, Skyguy.”

“My bad,” he said, raising his hands placatingly as he looked down at her… except not as far down as he used to have to look. If he counted her montrals, she was almost as tall as him now.

“Anyway, any citizenship paperwork that goes through the new administrative agency gets expedited priority processing. So what usually takes months will go through in a month.”

“Maybe even weeks,” Anakin added. The Jedi had a similar expedited process for when they brought Force-sensitive children with no paperwork to Coruscant.

“ _And_ ,” Ahsoka continued, “since there’s no accurate count of how many clones there actually are, I’m sure no one would notice if there was some extra paperwork every now and then,” Ahsoka suggested innocently. “I’m sure there are clones who are going to be helping facilitate the paperwork and won’t mind sending a few extras for processing at the last minute or something…”

“You’re a genius, Snips.”

Her grin turned bashful as she said, “No need for such flattery, Skyguy. A Jedi lives to serve.”

* * *

It took another six months before the administrative agency to grant the clones full citizenship got off the ground. But as frustratingly slow as the process was, it was time that Anakin used to plan with Beru.

He hadn’t wanted much Jedi involvement at first. Ahsoka asked him if he honestly thought he would be able to pull this off without _some_ covert Jedi backing, especially since the Senate all but put the Jedi in charge of organizing the clones since they were already leading them. Anakin relented, but only those Ahsoka was sure she could trust to either turn a blind eye or to actively help facilitate the process. In the end, Ahsoka got Obi-wan on board, Plo Koon, Aayla Secura, and Shaak Ti.

“Ahsoka,” Anakin asked with narrowed eyes when she informed him while they were watching the twins play in a park. “How did you get a whole third of the council to become accomplices to breaking Republic law to smuggle slaves to freedom in the Republic?”

“Well, of course, Obi-wan was going to help even if he’s going to pretend he’s not. And Plo Koon has practically adopted his entire battalion of clones and seemed like he’d be more than happy to support a cause like this. Shaak Ti was the Jedi liaison for Kamino. So of course, she’s going to be involved in helping process the citizenship some kind of way, and she’s one of the few people who would notice something off. It was either get her involved or find a way around her. And I didn’t mean to get Aayla involved, but she figured out I was up to something and wanted in.”

“Since when are you on a first-name basis with her?” Anakin asked.

“She’s shockingly practical and progressive. We hang out sometimes. Lament over the fact that sometimes the Jedi Order feels like a patriarchal boys club because it is the only way to make sense of the sheer idiocy that is the decisions they make sometimes,” Ahsoka explained. Then she raised an eye marking and asked, “What? Jealous I have friends outside of you and your circle?”

“No. I’m glad.”

Ahsoka had never explicitly said it to him. But Barriss’ betrayal followed by the Council’s had been a terrible blow to not just her ability to trust anyone but also her willingness to. So it was comforting to know she was starting to get past that. Rebuilding her relationships with people like Plo and Obi-wan. Starting new ones with Aayla. Venturing out into dating. It was a lot more than Anakin could say for himself.

Ahsoka didn’t appear to know what to do with that comment as she tilted her head while looking at him contemplatively.

“Thanks,” she finally said with a warm smile that Anakin returned.

They turned their attention back to the twins.

* * *

“Do you have any hobbies outside of work, this, and the twins?” his sister-in-law asked him once.

“What do you mean?”

“Like hanging out with other adults.”

“I do hang out with other adults. Obi-wan. Ahsoka. And I’ve been volunteering at the agency that’s administrating all the clone stuff. Some of the staff is nice.”

“What about dating anyone? It’s been almost two years since you and Padmé separated.”

Dating. Anakin hadn’t really thought about it. For the longest, he hadn’t been in the headspace for it. Frankly, he still wasn’t sure he was. But he certainly hadn’t been ready for anything that first year after separating from Padmé. And during and after that, he’d been busy trying to learn how to take care of himself and the twins and figure out why he’d felt so lost after he’d done everything that had been expected of him. That last part was still a battle. Though it had gotten better in the months helping the Liberty Resistance. Things had calmed down a little… But still.

“I don’t know if—”

“You’re not going to be alone for the rest of your life just because your first-ever relationship didn’t work out. You’re young. There are plenty of women—are you solely into women?—who would want to date you. I’m sure. War hero that saved the galaxy.”

“Women,” Anakin answered. “And as far as I’m concerned, war hero that saved the galaxy is just one of many reasons they should not want to date me.”

Beru ignored the last part. “What kind of women do you like?”

How should he know? It was like Beru said. Padmé had been his first and only relationship. And they’d reunited, spent a week together, and rushed into a marriage at the beginning of a war. In hindsight, that was probably really stupid. And if they had waited, they might have figured out they weren’t the most compatible. That they saw the galaxy very differently and thought fixing it needed very different approaches that they couldn’t help the other with.

When he didn’t answer, Beru continued, “What did you like about Padmé?”

“She’s kind to everyone. Even the people who don’t deserve it. Strong. Capable, but not afraid to ask for help when she needs it. Not afraid to speak her mind,” Anakin added.

At least, she hadn’t been afraid to speak her mind when it came to everyone else. In those final days and months of their marriage, it was almost like she’d stopped talking much entirely. He’d thought it was the war. Or the pregnancy. But more and more, he wondered if that had been his fault. Because every time she said something he didn’t agree with, he’d shut her down.

“Well, start there,” Beru encouraged.

Anakin laughed but didn’t think much about it over the next year. He ended up taking a job at the Clone Relief Administration as a consultant, what with having worked closely with the clones. Also, it helped to have the hero of the Republic to get sympathy from the public. In other words, he was being paid to look pretty and get them good press. It paid less than the engineering, but it also meant that his day job and his side hobby of smuggling slaves into the Republic were pretty much the same thing now.

“You spend a lot of time with Ahsoka, don’t you?” Padmé asked.

Anakin tore his eyes away from watching Ahsoka sit with Luke and Leia while showing them how to play with the toy she got them for their third birthday. It was commonly used in the temple to help small younglings learn concentration. Only just the right hold in the Force would cause the ball to light up a certain way. The twins followed her instruction with rapt attention while Ahsoka looked on fondly at them.

“Yeah. Why?” Anakin asked.

“Just an observation,” Padmé replied. “The twins talk about her all the time. So I figured they saw her a lot, and thus so did you.”

“I see her more now with the new job,” Anakin added. While the official document and legal papers granting the clones citizenship could be delivered over holonet, the ones for the Liberty Resistance had to be hand-delivered. Ahsoka was one of a trusted few who would run the paperwork to them. Rendezvousing in pre-determined locations to pass it on.

Anakin didn’t particularly like that she did. It was dangerous work. The hutts and crime lords could more easily get to her out there when they figured out something was going on (and they would, Anakin knew). But Ahsoka could take care of herself, as she made sure to frustratedly remind him the one and only time he mentioned his reservations to her. No longer was she the scrawny little teenager people thought they could underestimate. People actually looked twice at her now.

Padmé hummed a little and then took a sip of the sparkling drink that had been reserved for the adults to sip on. Then she said, “So. Dating anyone yet?”

Why did people keep asking him this?

“Are you?”

“I asked first, Ani.”

“No.”

“It’s been three years.”

“I could say the same for you.”

“Yes, but I won’t have time for that for at least another,” she paused to count, “nine years.”

She was talking about her bid for chancellor, Anakin guessed. Bail Organa wasn’t running for reelection to spend more time with his wife and their newly adopted daughter. Padmé planned to take his place before the Naboo Senator term limits made her ineligible to run.

“Why is everyone so concerned about me and my dating life?”

“Because after everything, if anyone deserves their own piece of happiness with someone, it's you,” Padmé said earnestly. She gave him a smile, the same kind smile she’d given him nearly seventeen years ago when he was a just nine-year-old boy, and then went to talk to Rex in the corner.

Anakin went back to watching Ahsoka.

* * *

As expedited as the citizenship process was, it was still slow going. The clones on leave from patrols of old separatist space from the war were still housed in barracks on Coruscant. They were gracious enough to allow Anakin and Ahsoka to use their gym to spar sometimes. When Ahsoka could talk him into picking up his old lightsaber. He didn’t mind. It was good to keep him active and fresh. Ahsoka was insistent that they could do this at the Jedi Temple, but Anakin hadn’t stepped foot there for three years, and he didn’t plan on breaking that any time soon.

Obi-wan joined them today. Not to spar with them. He was apparently worn out from a mission, which led to not a small amount of teasing from Anakin and Ahsoka about how he was getting old. But afterward, they planned on getting dinner together.

Every now and then, to be the troll that he was, Obi-wan nitpicked Anakin’s form. Anakin took it for the good-natured teasing that it was.

“Seems like Ahsoka needs to teach you now.”

“At least I’m not old,” Anakin shot back and nearly lost the match in his distraction.

They eventually called it a draw. Ahsoka had gotten good over the years. With the advantage of consistent practice as opposed to him picking up his lightsaber whenever she convinced him to, she might have bested him if they’d gone any longer.

And he would have never heard the end of it. Not that Anakin thought he would have minded.

As they went to grab their things, Ahsoka began talking about something or another, but Anakin found himself distracted watching her instead. How was it that even sweaty, a little swollen from their workout, in nothing but a pair of old sweats and a sports bra did she managed to be so… glowing maybe was the word? Not because of the fine sheen of sweat but just so alluring… She’d really grown up over the years.

“Anakin.”

Anakin snapped out his stupor.

“You okay?” Ahsoka asked.

“Yeah. Just… tired.”

She touched his arm. “You sure you up to dinner?”

Anakin shook his head. “I’m fine.

She didn’t look convinced but removed her hand and went to shower. The spot on his arm felt achingly cold without her warmth.

His gaze lingered on her as she left.

Obi-wan sighed behind him.

“Anakin.”

“What?” Anakin said, blinking out his stare yet again.

Obi-wan looked to where Ahsoka had retreated and then back to Anakin, looking painfully unimpressed.

“What?” Anakin asked again.

Obi-wan considered him for a long moment. Then he said, “You may have discontinued your commitment to the Jedi Order, but Ahsoka has not. I hope whatever your intentions are, you keep that in mind.”

A familiar frustration that only Obi-wan knew how to kindle began to well up in Anakin at his former master’s crypticness.

“If there’s something you want to say, Obi-wan, just say it.”

Now Obi-wan looked amused. For the life of him, Anakin couldn’t figure out why. He could usually trace the trajectory of Obi-wan’s feelings when Anakin had done something. But Anakin hadn’t been doing anything except appreciating how much Ahsoka had blossomed and come into herself over the years. He could see why she wasn’t lacking for dates and romantic attention. As Luke said every time he saw her, and Anakin always silently agreed with him, Ahsoka was very pretty. More than that. She—

…

_Oh, no._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I have a very hard time writing Anakin and Padmé in as romantic partners, but it is shockingly easy to write them as just friends. Probably because they actually work better as just friends, in my opinion. At least without having to do too much tweaking to Padmé's and Anakin's canon characterization. It always just feel like so much more work to make their romance believable, even though I've managed it before.
> 
> 2) The whole Anakin's mother being freed and marrying the man who freed her is a bit... dicey in canon. While it very well could have been that the two genuinely fell in love and wanted to get married, it could also be that Shmi was coerced into the whole thing. Did they fall in love first and then Cliegg decided to free her? Where else would she have gone if she said no? She had no other real options. Could she have even gotten off Tatooine on her own to find her son if that's what she wanted? There are a lot of questions that canon doesn't answer except to give us one piece of evidence. That Cliegg went after her when she was kidnapped, knowing the dangers the Tuskens posed, lost his leg trying to get her back, and appeared very pained that he couldn't try to keep looking for her. I have chosen in this universe that Shmi chose to marry Cliegg of her own free will without any type of coercion despite the very questionable circumstances. At the very least, she weighed the options she had and decided she could live a happy life with people who cared for her and treated her good.
> 
> Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for all the kudos, comments, and subscriptions on the last chapter. Keep them coming. I appreciate it.


	3. Part Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Anakin is hopelessly clueless, and Ahsoka humors him... at first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a warning that this chapter has explicit content. I mean, I rated appropriately from the beginning but just in case anyone missed it. It's only a 1k section, so if you don't want to read it. Just go to the next section when you run into it. Enjoy.

The thing about government jobs was that when everything was going smooth, it was fairly predictable. Anakin got weekends off and, if there wasn’t a lot for him to do, could leave early or even take a few days off to make a paper run himself for the Liberty Resistance when no one else was available to do it. But that also meant that when things went wrong, they went wrong badly. And he had to go in even if it was supposed to be his week off. And he had the twins while Padmé was off-planet on a diplomatic mission. And their nanny was off-planet on a planned vacation.

A last-minute babysitter shouldn’t have been so difficult to find. But because of how high profile Padmé still was and he used to be, finding people to watch the twins was a long process that could take months. Like it had when their first nanny quit.

Anakin didn’t want to resort to Ahsoka. After the dismaying realization that he probably liked Ahsoka as much more than an older brother would or even just a friend, he’d been trying to create some distance between them. Easier said than done. He hadn’t realized how integrated into his life Ahsoka was, so he still saw her way more often than he was trying to. He would have called Obi-wan. But he knew the man was stuck in Council meetings all day with no time to look after two rambunctious and curious Force-sensitive three-year-olds coming into their powers.

Ahsoka was his only option.

She agreed easily like Anakin knew she would. As fucked as Anakin knew he was about this entire situation with Ahsoka, he couldn’t say that hearing Luke and Leia singing in the back of the speeder that they got to spend the day with Ahsoka (at the Jedi Temple specifically) didn’t bring a smile to his face. The two impatiently began fiddling with the straps of their speeder seats before Anakin brought the speeder to a stop. Luke had already managed to undo his by the time Anakin opened the backseat to get them out and was trying to help Leia with hers. Anakin sat Luke on the ground, all the while wondering when he’d figured out how to undo the seats, and then undid Leia’s restraints. Leia was out the seat and managed to get past Anakin and out the speeder before he could offer to help her.

By the time he got both their backpacks out along with their bag of snacks, they’d already met Ahsoka at the Temple entrance. Both were jumping up and down while telling her everything they wanted to do and see in the Temple.

“You sure you’ll be okay with them?” Anakin asked.

Ahsoka rolled her eyes as she took the bags from Anakin. “We’ll be fine.”

“There are snacks in there. They already had breakfast, but I didn’t have time to make their lunch. You can order something out for them, though. I left some credits in the zipper pocket of Leia’s bag. And—”

“Anakin, I got it,” Ahsoka cut him off with yet another roll of her eyes. Then her features softened, and she gave him a warm smile. “We’ll be fine.”

A few months ago, he would have just given her an “okay, I trust you” look and went on about his day. Today, he felt warm with contentment and peace at that smile, and he wondered since when did her smile made him feel that way or did he now feel that way because he was conscious that he liked her a lot more?

It occurred to him that he might be projecting. And though he hadn’t been a Jedi for years and thus hadn’t actively practiced tightly shielding his emotions to maintain that Jedi façade, Anakin considered that he may need to take up the practice again. If Ahsoka noticed anything, she didn’t say as she turned to go into the Temple and gestured for the twins to follow her.

Dropping the twins off at the Temple was the closest he’d been to the Temple in over three years, and that was as close as he planned. But when he went to pick up the twins later in the evening, Ahsoka told him the twins were in the middle of dinner and to come on to Obi-wan’s apartments until they were done. Thus he was faced with actually going into the Jedi Temple for the first time since he’d forfeited his place as a Jedi and all the rights and privileges that came with it. He resisted at first. The Jedi didn’t allow civilians into the Temple without an appointment, and certainly not into the living quarters without a personal Jedi escort, if at all.

_“It’s you, Skyguy. I already let the Temple guards know.”_

He didn’t have any other argument, so he parked his speeder and made his way up the imposing steps, past the large statutes and the Temple doors. He pretended to ignore the looks he got as he made his way through the halls he hadn’t forgotten over the years. Tried not to think about the fact that if not for one split second of doubt, he might have helped Palpatine to destroy all this. That he’d already made up his mind and resigned himself to destroying this place and would have if he hadn’t figured out that Palpatine didn’t know the secrets to preventing death. That sometimes, even when the depth of Palpatine’s plan was revealed and upon the realization that Palpatine probably never had any intention to help him and when Padmé and the twins hadn’t died—that sometimes, Anakin still wasn’t sure he had done the right thing. Especially on days when he had to do backroom plotting against the Republic and the Jedi in order to actually uphold the principles both institutions said they represented. At the very least, the Sith tended to be pretty upfront about the galactic conquering and subjugation and ruling through fear and evil and all that.

“Young Skywalker.”

Anakin knew he wouldn’t have been able to get in and out of the temple without someone stopping him, but did it have to be the grandmaster of the Order?

“Master Yoda,” Anakin said with a slight nod of his head.

“Been a long time, it has. To see you doing well, good, it is.”

That depended on his definition of well. But Anakin kept that to himself.

“Met your younglings, I did. Strong with the Force, they both are. Truly a delight, the Skywalker twins were. Much light and joy, their presences brought to the Temple today.”

“I… Thanks?”

Yoda nodded. “Bring them back more often, you should. A stranger, you should not make yourself be.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Anakin replied.

Yoda considered him for a long while before nodding his head and leaving Anakin to go on his way. Even for Yoda, that was a weird conversation. Anakin still wasn’t sure how he should take it by the time he arrived at Obi-wan’s apartment.

The twins were sitting at the small table, finishing their dinner while Obi-wan and Ahsoka sat with a cup of tea while watching them.

“Daddy!” They both exclaimed. A look from Ahsoka made them paused to chew and swallow their food before they spoke in tandem with each other again

They babbled as though they were never going to have another chance to tell him, sometimes pausing to bicker like they always did. Anakin wasn’t clear about some things, but he figured he could clarify it with them later. Or with Ahsoka. But one thing was abundantly clear, and they both made sure of it.

“We’re going to be Jedi like Ahsoka,” Luke declared more than once. Leia backed him up with a vigorous nod of her head each time.

“We’ll see about that,” Anakin stated.

He wasn’t going to outright dampen their excitement. He had every intention of training them to use their powers. Had already even started with some basic exercises. But they wouldn’t be Jedi. He would not permanently sign their custody away to the Order. Just because he backtracked and hadn’t helped take them down and had grown to appreciate a few select members more didn’t mean he particularly liked the Order any more than he had back then. Padmé would definitely not sign them over. The Naboo didn’t believe in turning their children over to the Jedi, and they hadn’t since joining the Republic some almost nine hundred years ago. Finders didn’t even travel to Naboo to investigate Force-sensitive children. It was one of the reasons they missed Palpatine.

Luckily, the twins didn’t insist on arguing with him about it.

“Oh!” Leia said brightly. “We met the circle people.”

“The circle people?” Anakin asked, this time looking to Ahsoka for help.

“The Jedi Council.”

Anakin snickered. He wished he’d come up with that before. Fitting for people who sat in a circle, in a circular room, and argued in circles all day.

Wait.

“How’d they see the Council chambers?”

“I had a meeting with the Council. Took them with me. They did a very good job sitting where I left them with their tablet. Didn’t fight over it once while I took care of important business,” Ahsoka said, more to the twins.

Both nodded vigorously at the praise.

“How did you get permission from the Council to let you do that?”

“She didn’t,” Obi-wan replied.

“An old friend taught me that it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission,” Ahsoka said with a coy smile in Anakin’s direction. “Besides, Master Yoda is quite smitten with them.”

“He told me when I saw him in the hall earlier,” Anakin replied. It came out more tersely than he intended.

“Since you’re done,” Ahsoka suddenly said to the twins, “Why don’t you go wash your hands and pack up your toys to get ready to go?”

Luke and Leia chirpily agreed.

It was going to take them at least three times as long to do all that without an adult to guide them, but Anakin was sure that’s what Ahsoka was counting on.

Obi-wan started. “Don’t worry. The finders aren’t going to be knocking on your door asking you to consider letting them train at the Temple.”

“You say that like they come knocking on your door and ask you to simply enroll them in day classes or something. Not completely relinquish all custody and rights to see them,” Anakin snapped.

“You’re right,” Ahsoka said with her arms crossed. “I don’t see why it can’t, though. Be like a day school. Or even a boarding school type thing.”

Obi-wan sighed. “Ahsoka. Please. Let’s not—”

“What are you talking about?”

Obi-wan and Ahsoka exchanged a look. Finally, Obi-wan said, “There are talks about… revising our recruiting process. Just talks. Nothing serious.”

“Nothing serious if you don’t consider the Jedi’s extinction serious,” Ahsoka replied.

That was news to him.

“It’s certainly not _that_ serious,” Obi-wan argued.

Ahsoka narrowed her eyes at Obi-wan and then turned to Anakin.

“You weren’t the only one who walked away after the war. Dozens did. And if not for the advantage that certain positions give them, a few others would have too. Aayla was going to. She still might. Especially since Bly’s citizenship papers went through.”

Obi-wan sighed and then admitted, “Enrollment of younglings is down. The war significantly reduced our numbers and left a stain on our reputation throughout the galaxy. People less willing to give their children to the Order. Laws on many planets banning compulsory tests for sensitivity, which make the finders’ jobs harder. And, frankly, the poster boy of the war backing out and retreating from the limelight didn’t do the Jedi any favors either.”

“So what? You’re blaming me for this?”

“No, Anakin,” Obi-wan said with a long-suffering sigh. “Just stating factors that are contributing to the Order’s dilemma.”

“Let’s not forget the Council’s unwillingness to evolve,” Ahsoka muttered.

Anakin could not help but notice how ironic it was that he’d prevented the Order’s downfall by the Sith only for the Order to be causing its downfall by its own hands. Or maybe it was still the Sith. Some of it anyway. The distrust, the ruined reputation, the blame for the war. Maybe that was how Palpatine had planned to get away with killing all the Jedi with minimum uproar. By making the galaxy think they deserved it. And while Anakin would be the first to say that the Order had made some terrible missteps and wouldn’t hesitate to voice them if asked, he didn’t think they deserved destruction. Not anymore.

“We can’t ask the Order to throw away a thousand years of tradition, Ahsoka.”

“It was too late for that when we threw them out the airlock for a war.”

“What choice did we have?”

“What choice do we have now?”

“I know you have your grievances with the Order, Ahsoka. But—”

“And I’ve never denied that. But I’ve also always thought it was clear that the reason I have them is because I actually do love this place and don’t want to see it die. If we don’t change something, there won’t be a Jedi Order in the next hundred years.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“Master Nu showed me her research. No one wants to say it, but that’s the trajectory,” Ahsoka replied.

“A hypothetical.”

“We changed once. After the last great war. We can change again.”

“So what?” Anakin interjected. “You want to use my kids as guinea pigs for your experiment?”

Ahsoka replied quickly, “No. Not like that.”

“That’s what it sounds like.”

“It’s not.”

“Then what is it?” Anakin snapped.

Neither Obi-wan nor Ahsoka answered. Ahsoka didn’t seem bothered, but the slight tension in Obi-wan’s shoulders made Anakin realize how much of his anger he was projecting.

“Sorry,” he said, pulling his anger back from the broader Force and toward himself.

The twins ran into the room with their bags and shoes at that moment.

“I’ll walk you all out,” Ahsoka stated.

Only once Anakin strapped both twins into their speeder seats ten minutes later did Ahsoka finally say, “They asked Obi-wan and me to run the idea by you months ago. Obi-wan flat out refused, but the rest of the Council thought you’d take the idea better from me anyway. I told them I’d find the right moment to discuss it. But only so they wouldn’t actually vote to send someone else to talk to you. You’ve got friends on the Council, but their vote only counts for so much.”

“You didn’t plan to tell me at all,” Anakin surmised.

“No. I planned to lie to the Council if they asked me about it.”

“Why are you telling me now?”

Ahsoka glanced into the speeder window where the twins were already knocked out from their long day.

“After my meeting with the Council, Yoda insisted they come and join him for one of the youngling classes. Both of them enjoyed it a lot. Leia wouldn’t stop asking questions, and Master Yoda answered every single one. But Luke… Luke loved every second of it and interacting with other Force-sensitive younglings. It’s like he was meant to be there.” Ahsoka turned her gaze back to Anakin. “And I thought… maybe there’s a middle ground. And who better to test it than with children who have a father that’s a former Jedi.”

Any leftover anger from the earlier discussion left Anakin.

“Maybe,” he said. He’d have to talk to Padmé.

He started to get into the speeder. Ahsoka grabbed his arm. He turned back.

“You’re not the only one with apprehensions. Like I said. I love the Jedi, and I love being a Jedi. I think it’s where I belong. But I don’t want them to grow up like we did either.”

She let go and playfully punched him in the arm.

“Later, Skyguy.”

* * *

He and Padmé agreed to once a week. Once a week, the twins would spend a full day of youngling classes at the Jedi Temple, and they’d see how it went from there. They also agreed three-year-olds tended to have a very short attention span, and one day of disinterest was nothing to be alarmed about. But if either showed any persistent signs of disinterest, they’d stop the weekly training and maybe revisit when the twins were older.

Three months in and the twins showed no signs of disinterest yet.

His crush on Ahsoka also didn’t wane. What he thought was a passing admiration borne of loneliness he didn’t want to admit to only increased. And it didn’t help that every week, unless she was on a mission, Ahsoka was there to take the twins into the Temple in the morning and escort them out in the late afternoons.

One such day, Ahsoka dropped the twins off at the Senate to their mother. Anakin happened to be there because sometimes his job involved taking reports and briefs to Senators to make sure getting the clones their citizenship didn’t cost too much money. Anakin suggested that maybe they slash the part of the yearly budget dedicated to one Senator’s expensive habit of gourmet seafood from Mon Cala. While he was there, Anakin decided to run by Padmé the feasibility of taking the twins to Tatooine. Beru and Owen wanted to meet them. But also, Tatooine was a dangerous planet that may or may not be on the brink of civil war.

“By the way,” Ahsoka started on her way out, stopping just in front and to the side of him, with her shoulder nearly brushing his, “we still on for sparring this weekend?”

Did she really have to stand so close to him?

“Yeah,” he managed to breathe out.

Ahsoka considered him for a moment, like she was about to say something else, but just shook her head and left.

“You,” Padmé began when Ahsoka was out of earshot, “are hopeless.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“It’s that obvious.”

Anakin put his hands over his face. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Simple. Ask her out on a date. She got out of her last relationship over a month ago. I think she wanted something more stable. Serious. They didn’t. At least, not with her.”

Anakin heard about that. Ahsoka had been quite upset about it, though she’d gotten over it quickly enough. It still irritated him, though. How could anyone have had a woman as bright and caring and capable as Ahsoka was and then decide they didn’t want her? They’d been lucky she’d been with them at all.

“It’s not that simple,” Anakin answered. “What if… what if she says no?”

“That certainly didn’t deter you from pursuing me. In fact, I’m surprised you’re being so cautious.”

“I hadn’t seen you in a decade and wasn’t sure I’d see you again and decided to take the opportunity while I had it. I had nothing to lose with you. But I’d rather never do anything and just stay friends than make things awkward and uncomfortable for her because I made a move, and she didn’t feel the same way.”

“If that’s how you feel, Ani, I’m sure it’s safe to say that you and Ahsoka’s friendship will be perfectly fine.” A pause. Then she added, “Besides, I’m pretty sure Ahsoka already knows.”

Anakin slowly took his hands away from his face in alarm.

“Already knows what?”

“That you like her. Romantically, that is.”

“She doesn’t. She… She _can’t_.”

“Anakin, she figured out we were married within the first month of her apprenticeship to you.”

* * *

She couldn’t know. There was no way she knew.

* * *

“That,” Anakin said after a sparring session a few days later, “is going to scar.”

“Sorry,” Ahsoka said, inspecting the scratch she’d accidently given him on his arm.

Anakin shrugged. “Wouldn’t be the first.”

Ahsoka smirked. “Maybe one day you’ll show me the rest.”

Anakin wasn’t quite sure what to do with that one. If he didn’t know any better…

“I might even let you give me one,” she added before practically sashaying away.

* * *

Fuck. She knew.

* * *

In a way that was so Ahsoka that Anakin shouldn’t have been surprised but was surprised anyway, Ahsoka took the matter of his attraction to her into her own hands.

She asked him out.

Anakin thought anyway.

He still wasn’t sure if her flirting was just playful teasing or mocking or something more serious. So he didn’t assume. For all he knew, it might be her way of letting him down gently. Especially because it was less her asking him out and more her saying that she wanted to check out some new exhibit at a museum. Some history of space travel thing with a newly uncovered ship from the ruins of some planet, pre-hyperspace and even sublight travel. But she didn’t want to go alone. Never mind that though Ahsoka didn’t hate flying like Obi-wan did, she certainly wasn’t as a fanatic about it as Anakin, who kept up with all the latest developments in space travel, ships, and piloting. Even things that civilians like him technically weren’t supposed to know. One way or another, she’d planned this specifically with him in mind. Anakin just wasn’t sure why.

That said, she’d broken up with her last boyfriend months ago. Usually, by now, Ahsoka would have mentioned someone new to him. Or maybe she was just taking a break from the dating. She’d done that once. About a year ago.

He was so preoccupied with what her intentions might be that he almost couldn’t concentrate on the new exhibit. Almost. Because it was fascinating how even a ship somehow preserved from thousands of years ago was still the foundation of ships built today. And not even his anxiety around Ahsoka could distract him from that.

Anakin thought their day would end with the museum. But she decided she was hungry afterward. Even had a restaurant that was in the area that she’d conveniently wanted to try for months. Anakin wasn’t sure he’d been able to get through that without making a fool of himself, so halfway to the restaurant, he plucked up the courage to ask.

“So…” he trailed off.

Ahsoka stopped walking and turned to him with an expectant look.

“So what?” she asked.

“What is all this?”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

Her lips were twitching for some reason. Anakin tore his gaze away. That was the last place he should be paying attention to.”

“I mean… Is this supposed to be a date?” he asked cautiously.

She broke out into a grin.

“Padmé was sure you would eventually get the hint. Obi-wan thought I was going to have to spell it out for you. I have to say, Skyguy, I was starting to think Obi-wan might be right. But if he and Padmé were making bets, he definitely lost.” Then she let out a sigh of relief. “Good. I was getting tired of waiting for you to figure out I was okay with all this.”

He was going to have words with Padmé and Obi-wan both about this. Letting him sweat about this when they knew all along…

“Okay with…”

Ahsoka gave him a dry look. “Oh, come on. I’ve known you had a crush on me for months. I didn’t even try to hide that I knew after a while. I’ve been waiting for you to say something. I never took you as the cautious type.”

“I’m not,” Anakin agreed. For Force’s sake, he was using his government job to smuggle slaves out of slavery and make them Republic citizens against Republic law. No matter how carefully he did that, it wasn’t the act of a cautious man. “But it’s you. I didn’t want to mess us up.”

Like he’d messed up so many other things. The Jedi. The war. Palpatine. Padmé. Obi-wan. Even though he, by some miracle, worked all those things out in the end. Anakin really did not want to add Ahsoka to that list. He didn’t want to risk that.

She gave him that warm smile that made him feel as though everything was right in the galaxy.

“That,” she said while reaching up and boldly resting her arms over his shoulder with her hand locked behind his neck, “is really sweet of you.”

Frankly, Anakin might have been perfectly happy for the foreseeable future with Ahsoka’s arms around him, his arms resting on her waist, and her body just pressed lightly against his. Then she kissed him.

Anakin didn’t hesitate to kiss her back with all the uncertainty out the way. She pulled away just briefly, barely a hairsbreadth, before kissing him again. He pulled away the next time only to grab her bottom lip between his teeth and gently pull her mouth open. He licked just inside her lips, and she let out a shaky breath that Anakin took for encouragement. But while he definitely wanted to spend time figuring out what she liked and what she didn’t, they were in a very public street on Coruscant. So he pressed one openmouthed kiss on her mouth and pulled away.

Ahsoka tried to bring him back in. Anakin pulled back.

When she pouted, he said, “I really don’t want to have another photo of me on the front of a tabloid or going around the holo media.” Goodness knew every now and then, the media managed to get a holo of him and Padmé and speculated that the two were getting back together again. Then he added, “Especially not of us.”

Because she was still a Jedi. This was _technically_ still against the rules and a violation of their code. It wasn’t being strictly enforced right now, but Anakin didn’t want to push the envelope. Didn’t want to jeopardize her place in the Order.

“Right,” she said, pulling away from him, bringing her arms back to himself. “Dinner?”

She didn’t sound particularly eager about that anymore. Frankly, neither was he.

“Or we can order in,” Anakin suggested. “Later, that is.”

Ahsoka grinned in response.

* * *

On some very aloof and observational level, Anakin had always been aware that Ahsoka had grown up into a stunning woman. It was hard not to notice between watching her take on more and more solo missions that she never would have been allowed to be briefed on when she was under him, the dating, the long and short term partners that resulted from the dating, and the passing casual mentions of sexual harassment on missions. Some of which she used to her advantage. Other times, like in the Senate, the harassment was just annoying. According to her. She would never give him the names of the people responsible.

_I neither need nor want you going to prison for assaulting someone over me._

Anakin wasn’t sure exactly when it had gone from an aloof observation to an attraction that he wanted to act on. Likely long before he was conscious of it. And it was going to take some getting used. On both their parts, Anakin sensed. Not to say that either one of them was particularly shy. But there was just some trepidation about suddenly making the jump from former teacher-student duo, sometimes siblings, always friends, colleagues by some standards to potential lovers. Depending on how this went.

They were both naked, lying on his bed with Ahsoka straddling him while she silently admired him with her eyes. Every now and then, her fingers found a scar, one of many that she teased him about letting her see a few months ago. And then she leaned back, making her way down until she was level with his cock. His heart skipped, and the muscles in his abdomen spasmed at feeling her hot breath on him.

“Um…” she suddenly began. “Are you okay with me…?”

She brought her mouth closer to him.

Fuck. Yes. He was okay with it. But he sensed something else behind her hesitancy.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

She shrugged. “Well, most guys aren’t particularly excited about how sharp my teeth are and having them near their cock,” she answered. Then she added wryly, “Especially when they’re rumored to be poisonous.”

Anakin scoffed at that. That rumor persisted everywhere. Though, ironically, it didn’t stop togruta females from having some favor on the slave market.

“Go ahead,” Anakin encouraged.

“I’ve never done it before.”

“I imagine you wouldn’t have with the poisonous fangs and all,” Anakin teased. “But I always was an adrenaline junkie that lived for the thrill of danger.”

Ahsoka laughed a little before closing her eyes and taking his cock in her mouth.

Anakin’s hips surged upward some, wanting to be enveloped by as much of the heat of her mouth as he could. She pulled back slowly, accompanying it with a suctioning sensation until her mouth was just on the tip of him, licking him with her tongue before taking as much of him into her mouth again as she could. Across their force bond, Anakin felt her probe at him for some kind of validation that this was okay. He both nodded with a contented sigh and sent eager encouragement for her to keep going back across their bond, along with a faint impression of what her hot mouth felt like on him. She shuddered above him once and kept going.

Heat spread through his body, building in the room, in the Force as she continued her ministrations, getting more confident as she went along. Eventually, she rested her elbows on his thighs and held the base of his erection with one hand while playing with and tugging on his balls with the other.

She took her mouth all the way off once and muttered, “Come on,” before enveloping him once more. This time boldly, daringly, just barely grazing him with her teeth as she lifted her mouth up, her eyes open and watching for his reaction as she did so.

“Fuck,” he groaned as his cock began to pulse.

When her mouth was off this time, she used her tongue to lick his tip, periodically urging him to come until finally, he did. His cum spilling onto his stomach and part of her mouth.

Ahsoka sat up and wiped her face with the back of her hand, a small self-satisfied smile on her face. On its own, the motion shouldn’t have been particularly arousing or titillating. But with her sitting there, naked, breasts perked and dark nipples, the same color of her swollen lips, it was everything.

Anakin pulled pushed himself up on his elbows and pulled her to him. They fell back again, with her lying on top of him, pressing sloppy kisses on each other until Anakin was hard again. She lifted her hips to maneuver his cock into her tight, hot sex. She leaned up slightly, bracing hands against his shoulder as she moved her hips up and down, rocking back and forth on him. Her pants and gasps for air turning into desperate whines. The bracing grip on his shoulders tightening. Her nails digging into his skin. The tension building and tightening inside him and her.

Ahsoka let out a long hiccupping whimper, whining his name as her walls clenched tight around his cock and her body began to tremble above him. Anakin rolled them over, continued to thrust into her as she continued to writhe from pleasure beneath them. Her hand mindlessly reaching down to touch her clit.

He thought there had been no escaping or avoiding her before. But now she was everywhere. Surrounding him. Consuming him. Touching him. Seeing him laid bare in every way. Not knowing where she ended and he began in the Force. And that felt as good as being sheathed inside her. Through their bond, he sent her what she looked like to him, what she felt like to him.

She arched her hips further upward into him to meet his thrusts. Then the Force sang to a crescendo around them until he felt and heard her come again, and he groaned out his own orgasm.

Ahsoka was nowhere near as small as she’d been when he first met her, but Anakin was still bigger than her. So he made sure not to totally crush her when he let himself collapse from bracing himself above her. He wasn’t completely successful, what with still being inside her, so he was still lying half on top of her. Not that Ahsoka seemed to mind.

“It feels,” Ahsoka paused to pant out a few breaths, “It feels different with another Force user.” A pause. “In a good way. A great way.”

Anakin laughed and said sleepily, “You mean none of your ‘friends’ were ever other Jedi?”

“No.” She paused. “Not seriously enough to get this far.”

“Why not?”

Ahsoka shrugged. “I don’t really know.”

She was lying. Or maybe not lying but not able to put into words her feelings about it and not feeling like struggling through it. Anakin had a guess why, though. She may have started rebuilding trust and reforming bonds and was helping to forcefully drag kicking and screaming the Order into evolving and a new, changed, post-war era. And she wasn’t alone in that effort, but she was still an unorthodox Jedi in many ways. Ways that the Order had once used to justify condemning her. Hotheaded when it came to injustice or doing the right thing (though nowhere near to the extent that he was), outspoken, and with a quick wit that Obi-wan even had trouble keeping up with. She could be a lot for most relatively normal Jedi to handle.

“So I guess I should be honored then,” he said smugly.

Anakin could practically hear Ahsoka roll her eyes as she said, “You’re not a Jedi.”

Right.

* * *

A photo of them wrapped intimately in each others’ arms and kissing on a busy Coruscant sidewalk ended up on the cover of a tabloid and circulating the holo media by the next morning.

The Council reprimanded Ahsoka for her lack of discretion but otherwise made no comment about the relationship.

* * *

Now that he was on the other side of the relationship, the person waiting for a Jedi to show up at their doorstep in the evenings to spend nights, Anakin wondered if most of the Temple hadn’t known about his relationship with Padmé. Not just the people closest to them. There weren’t many things that a Jedi could be consistently doing when they weren’t on a mission that kept them from the Temple overnight. It made him wonder why no one had said anything if they really weren’t going to do anything. At least not immediately, anyway.

The effort of trying to keep his and Padmé’s relationship secret during the war nearly tore him apart. If anyone had given any hint that they’d known, that at least for the war it was okay, Anakin would have felt better. Wouldn’t have felt so isolated and misunderstood. Wouldn’t have ever felt like a Sith was his only option for help. Then again, how many times had Obi-wan all but come out and said that he knew what was going on? Maybe some of it was his own fault. Or maybe it was Palpatine in his head, making him see things that weren’t there, always managing to strengthen his doubts. Or maybe Palpatine hadn’t been strengthening much of anything except using certain truths to his advantage. Because Anakin would have noticed outright lies.

Anakin thought anyway.

He wasn’t entirely sure anymore.

The drawback to having someone sleeping in his bed again was that someone was there to notice his nightmares. They weren’t as bad as they’d been right after the war’s end. But every now and then, he woke up feeling cold, like the dark side had tried and failed to consume him. The impressions, images, and feelings of a possible future. Not a future that could come true or that he was about to run into. But a future just avoided, lingering at the edges of his consciousness with the fading sound of a… breathing machine or something.

Anakin managed to wake up without making any noise or moving so he wouldn’t disturb Ahsoka behind him. Only to reach back and find his efforts in vain because she wasn’t there. He checked the time to confirm that she hadn’t slipped out early to head to the Temple like she was prone to do if she had to get ready for a mission, but it was entirely too early for that. Besides, she wouldn’t have left like that today. She was taking the twins with her to the Temple for their now twice-weekly classes and wouldn’t have taken them without waking him.

He got up, checked to make sure the twins hadn’t been disturbed by his and Ahsoka’s wakening, and made his way to the living room and kitchen. Ahsoka was sitting curled in a corner of the couch, watching cartoons of all things yet not really watching them. She’d apparently been up for a while because a half-drunken cup of something still warm was sitting on the side table.

“Can I join you?”

“Your place,” Ahsoka replied without looking at him.

Anakin didn’t reply that it could be hers too. If she wanted. But it was probably too soon for that.

He sat next to her but didn’t touch her.

“You okay?”

She shrugged. “Just dreams.”

“Dreams.”

“Nightmares, really. About the war. Happens sometimes. Especially when things are really calm.”

Three years didn’t seem like a long time. But it was when it was war. So much destruction and fighting in so little time. Whole planets that took centuries and millennia to build, decimated by one battle. Ecosystems destroyed. Diplomatic relationships ruined. Millions dead. Millions more traumatized. So many close calls and near-death experiences that Anakin had lost count, and he’d lost all the fear that came with the threat of danger and death even now. Only three years to cause so much chaos and probably decades of having to fix things. If they could be fixed. A lot of planets would never be the same. Anakin figured it was the same way for the people who fought in the war.

Ahsoka didn’t volunteer what the nightmares were about. Anakin didn’t ask. It could have been anything. A number of missions. A number of experiences.

Eventually, she leaned over, slipped her arms under his, and wrapped her arms around him.

“I’m glad you’re here, Skyguy.”

Anakin paused before answering, not quite sure what to make of that statement. Because she didn’t sound like the calm, confident, capable adult woman he was sure he was falling pretty hard in love with. Tonight, she sounded like the fourteen-year-old girl he met on Christophsis who had no clue what she was doing but put on a brave face anyway. The girl who used to remind him of himself until she grew up and surpassed him. Some underlying terror in her voice that he wasn’t sure what to make of.

Finally, he simply rested his arm around her to hold her. She’d tell him when she wanted to.

“I’m glad you’re here too, Snips.” Then he added, “Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for all the kudos, comments, and subscriptions on the last chapter. Keep them coming. I appreciate it.


	4. Part Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, Anakin finds his way again...

Between the twins taking classes twice a week and dating Ahsoka, Anakin saw a lot more of the Jedi Temple than he ever thought he would again after leaving.

He didn’t even get a chance to knock on the door to Ahsoka’s apartment before the door slid open with the Force. She discarded the datapad she was looking at and immediately jumped up to greet him.

“Hey,” she said after a quick peck on the lips.

He raised an eyebrow at the eager way she’d jumped up.

“Hey,” he replied.

She was… not quite nervous but definitely uncertain.

“Where are the twins?”

“They’re in the back. Watching cartoons. But before they come out, I just wanna warn you. Today they learned—”

“Daddy, Daddy, Daddy,” Leia shouted as she ran from Ahsoka’s room with Luke right behind her.

Leia only stopped after she ran into his legs, clutching onto his pants and bouncing on the balls of her feet.

“You used to be a Jedi!” Leia demanded.

“You never told us that,” Luke added with a displeased pout.

“Yeah… They learned about that,” Ahsoka added dryly.

Before Anakin could figure out how to respond, Luke asked, “So were you really a Jedi? Did you really save the entire galaxy and destroy the Sith?”

It wasn’t that Anakin was particularly hiding that he used to be a Jedi from his children. He knew that one day between the holonet, the classes at the Temple, Obi-wan, and Ahsoka, they’d figure it out. But that didn’t mean he’d been looking forward to or prepared for it. He’d hoped it would be when they were older and not easily excitable four-year-olds who practically worshipped everything he did.

Because while people thought he was a hero, the savior of the Republic who figured out Palpatine’s devastating plot to put the entire galaxy in chains, Anakin knew he was no hero. He’d been little more than a pawn in Palpatine’s grand plan. The key to the destruction of the Jedi and Palpatine’s chosen enforcer to make sure that the Jedi never rose to challenge the Sith again. Every so-called act of heroism, every act of loyalty, every time he protected the people he cared about was really inadvertently helping Palpatine in his takeover. All while he was Jedi. As far as Anakin was concerned, his time as a Jedi was long behind him and nothing to be proud of.

“I don’t know about all that.”

“But you were a Jedi?” Leia insisted.

“I mean… I… yes,” Anakin finally answered.

“No way!” Leia said.

“Who do you think taught me everything I know?” Ahsoka asked.

Leia’s head turned so fast to Ahsoka that Anakin was afraid she might have sprained it.

“You mean like a padawan?” she asked. “You were Daddy’s padawan?”

“Yep. Trained me all the way to knighthood.”

“Not quite all the way,” Anakin interjected.

The twins wouldn’t hear it.

“You have to tell us all about it,” Luke said excitedly.

“We want to know everything,” Leia said, nodding enthusiastically.

“When we get home,” Anakin said. Hopefully, by then, they’d have moved onto something else.

“No! We want you and Ahsoka to tell us right now,” Leia insisted.

Anakin raised an eyebrow at her. To which Leia added softly, “Please?”

“Couldn’t hurt,” Ahsoka said with a shrug. “I thought you were going to be much later anyway, so I ordered food. I can’t eat it by myself. Might as well.”

Anakin sighed. “Fine.”

“Yay!” Luke and Leia said while clapping.

Talking about his life as a Jedi felt awkward at first. He hadn’t spoken or thought much about it since he left four years ago. But the more Luke and Leia asked questions and got excited and listened attentively, with Ahsoka chiming in and asking questions every now and then, the more comfortable Anakin felt. Especially considering that even after leaving out all the sordid and grim details that the twins couldn’t comprehend, there was still a surprising amount left of… good. A lot more than Anakin thought there was.

By the time Luke and Leia were done asking questions for the night, it was late, and they were practically falling asleep in their chairs.

“Why don’t you all stay?” Ahsoka suggested. “The couch lets out. The twins can sleep there.”

“A pullout couch? They weren’t giving those out at the commissary when I was here,” Anakin pointed out as Ahsoka began to let out the couch.

“I talked them into it. Came in handy that week Padmé was off-planet and you had to make that emergency paper run. They didn’t like the idea of sleeping with the rest of their clan in the crèche, so they stayed here,” Ahsoka commented.

Right. Them staying before also explained why she had a drawer with an extra set of clothes and pajamas for the twins. Unfortunately, Ahsoka didn’t have an extra set of clothes for him, so Anakin stripped off his shirt, undershirt, belt, and pants and crawled into bed behind Ahsoka, wearing only his briefs. He tried not to put too much thought into the fact that this would be the first time since the war ended (since before it really) that he was spending the night in the Jedi Temple. It felt… It didn’t feel as oppressive and haunting as Anakin thought it would feel. Just like talking about his Jedi past.

“That’s why you came back. Isn’t it?” Anakin muttered into Ahsoka’s lek.

“What’s why I came back?”

“The things we were telling the twins about. That’s why you came back.” Anakin added, “We really did do a lot of good. Despite everything.”

Despite the machinations of the Sith Lord to bring him to make him a Sith. Despite the war. Despite all the death, and grief, and loss, and disappointment, and destruction. Somehow, in the midst of all that, there was always a spark of light in the darkness. And even though the darkness had seemed so overwhelming, still felt so overwhelming, they’d done so much with the light they had. They’d met and helped a lot of good people.

“Yeah. We did,” Ahsoka replied. She put a hand over his, where it was resting on her waist. Then, “You did.”

Anakin still wasn’t sure about that, but he was more convinced than he had ever been in the last four years.

* * *

When life seemed too good to be true, it usually was. So when Anakin woke up one morning with a sense of danger and foreboding, he wasn’t even surprised. A younger him, one from during the war, would have panicked. But after a lifetime of dealing with the fallout and consequences of decisions made in haste, Anakin decided to take a minute to pause. First, he probed the Force in askance. Are the twins okay? Yes, it told him. Probably still asleep and about to be gotten up by their mother. Was Padmé okay? Yes, if a little exhausted from the stress of her new job as chancellor of the Republic. This had been the first time in two months that she was able to get her full week with the twins. Anakin probably would let her keep them for another week or two. They’d missed their mother the last few months, and Padmé missed them. Was Ahsoka okay? Yes. Probably sleeping in after a long mission. He’d see her later. Obi-wan? Just fine.

Anakin went through a few more checks of people and things that might cause such a foreboding feeling in the Force. Finally, he just outright probed the Force for an answer and was overcome with the urge to call Beru.

She didn’t answer the first time. Or the second time. Or the third. Not unusual. The long-range communications on Tatooine were still shoddy on the best of days. But especially now with a slave revolt practically in full force. Jabba had figured out that the slaves were getting help from off-planet and frequently jammed the communication to and from the planet to slow down the revolution. But Anakin had a feeling it was more than that. Because the call was connecting. He wasn’t getting the signal that the code was disconnected or the long loading or connecting times that signaled a lousy connection from Tatooine. Beru just wasn’t answering. It wasn’t like her. Especially since Coruscant and Tatooine mornings were synced right now, and she probably hadn’t left the house to do chores.

Something wasn’t right about that. And the more suspicious he became, the more the Force confirmed it.

“I need to go to Tatooine,” Anakin said to Padmé over comm as he was packing a bag. “Can I borrow a ship?”

“Tatooine? Ani, what?”

“I can’t explain it right now, Padmé. I have to go. I think Beru and Owen are in trouble.”

“Anakin, Tatooine is all but in the middle of a civil war. One that you’ve helped to instigate. If you go there, and someone finds out—or worse if this is a trap because Jabba already knows that—Ani, I can’t immediately send someone to help you if something goes wrong. It would take weeks to convince the Senate to repeal that treaty and possibly open the Republic to another war,” Padmé said.

“I know all that. But it’s not like the Senate is going to vote to intervene to help me save my stepbrother and sister-in-law.”

“I know. But, I’m just saying wait and think about this. Weigh your options. There has to be some other solution than throwing yourself heedlessly into danger without backup. It’s not just yourself to consider, you know.”

Anakin paused at that. Padmé was right. He had to consider more than just himself. Because it was his own selfishness that made him decide to join Sidious. To take on the name Darth Vader, before he had one moment of doubt—ironically borne out of selfishness too—and killed his new master. Not once had he considered or cared what anyone would think of his actions. How his actions would affect anyone else. It was all about him and what he stood to lose.

But this time wasn’t like that. Anakin didn’t think anyway. He had to go to Tatooine. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he didn’t. Not after everything Beru had done to help him. Not when he remembered the excitement on Beru’s and Owen’s faces when he told them they would arrange for them passage to Naboo so they could meet the twins for the first time and celebrate their fifth birthday. And maybe all of that was a little selfish still. But something told him this was bigger than him. Much bigger.

Besides, at least it didn’t involve turning to the dark side, killing the Jedi, and being the top enforcer in a Sith Empire.

“I know,” Anakin agreed gently. “And if there was any other way to find out what was going on, I’d do it. But there isn’t. And there’s no time to come up with an alternative and no one else to help. It’s Tatooine,” Anakin argued. “And if I get caught in a jam, if something happens, I’ll know you’ll do everything in your power to help. But I can’t wait.”

Padmé sighed. “I’ll have a ship ready for you within the hour.”

As promised, the ship was ready to go with Artoo waiting at the bottom of the ramp because Padmé wasn’t letting Anakin run off without the helpful droid by his side.

“Just like old times, huh buddy?” Anakin asked, patting the droid on his dome.

“Tell me about it.”

Anakin looked up to find Ahsoka leaning on the entryway at the top of the ramp.

“Ahsoka… what are you…?”

“Padmé messaged Obi-wan and me as soon as you said you needed a ship to go to Tatooine. She knew she wasn’t going to be able to talk you out of it, so she stalled some to give me some time to catch you and to give Obi-wan a head start on running interference with the Council for me.”

Ahsoka turned to go back into the ship. Anakin followed her into the cockpit, where she seated herself in the copilot’s chair.

“I’m not going to be able to talk you out of this, am I?” Anakin asked.

“Nope.” Then, “Yes, I know I’m going to get into so much trouble with the Council if this goes wrong. Yes, they’ll say I was blinded by my attachment to you and that it’s the reason why the Order has refrained from attachments like this for a thousand years. Yes, I’ve already prepared rebuttals to those admonishments, but I also really don’t care if they accept them or not,” Ahsoka rattled off. “So, shall we go?”

“Okay. This is a really weird time for confessions. But I love you. A lot,” Anakin added as he sat in the pilot’s chair and began to take off.

Ahsoka smiled and looked at him out the corner of her eye. “I already knew that.”

* * *

As much as he loathed it, Anakin had always known that something would draw him back to Tatooine. It had been inevitable, Anakin had thought, once he got involved helping Beru create Republic citizenship papers for those freed from slavery in the Outer Rim and chose not to stay. Sure, that line of work also could have taken him to other planets in the underground Liberty Alliance that he got papers for, but it was always Tatooine. For whatever reason, he couldn’t quite rid himself of his home planet.

When he and Ahsoka arrived at Beru’s and Owen’s homestead, Anakin was dismayed but unsurprised to find both signs of a struggle, the lingering smell of blaster fire, and his stepbrother and sister-in-law nowhere in sight. He and Ahsoka split up to look for signs exactly happened but found none.

“Where’s the nearest town or settlement?” Ahsoka asked. “We should try there first to get information. It’s been a few days. By now, word of what happened must have—”

The sound of the front entrance blasting open cut Ahsoka off, and even though it had been almost five years since he had to defend himself against hostile enemies, it was like Anakin had never been away from war. He lit his lightsaber without thought, blocking blaster bolts to cover both him and Ahsoka while she flipped the table over to serve as cover for them both until they could get an idea of how many combatants there were.

“Only seven,” Anakin said to Ahsoka after assessing the number. “Ready?”

Ahsoka nodded.

They jumped from behind their cover to engage their assailants. Then was a brief blue, red, and black blaster smoke before their assailants lay dead before them.

“Mercenaries,” Anakin said, now able to get a closer look.

Ahsoka gestured for him to be quiet. “Do you hear that?”

Togruta hearing was better than humans, so Anakin wouldn’t be surprised if he couldn’t, but Anakin strained to hear whatever it was anyway. It was the faint sound of blaster fire and fighting.

There was no telling what they would be running out to, but they had little choice but to leave the homestead to see what the ruckus was. They walked out into the middle of a firefight and were immediately forced to take cover behind the homestead. They carefully peeked around the side to see if they could determine the combatants.

“More mercenaries?” Ahsoka asked.

“Yes. Definitely. Probably working for Jabba and other slavers. But I think the other side is the resis—”

A grenade exploded, shook and disrupted the sand beneath, and lessened the visibility. It took the mercenaries by surprise and left them discombobulated. But their opponents had clearly prepared for this and pressed forward to gain the upper hand, eventually forcing them into a retreat.

“We should get back to the ship befo—”

The click and whine of a blaster cut Ahsoka off.

“Don’t shoot,” Anakin said to the combatants, wrapped in tan hides and robes to protect themselves from the sun.

They didn’t shoot, but they definitely didn’t lower their blasters as two of those without blasters began to converse.

“That… doesn’t sound like huttese,” Ahsoka said.

“It’s not.”

“Then what is it?”

Anakin didn’t answer her, instead speaking up in the secret language that the two in front of them spoke in. Conveying that he didn’t think they were enemies and that they were there to help. That got their attention.

“Skywalker,” the male voice said in Basic from under the wraps. “Anakin Skywalker.”

Anakin recognized that voice. The cadence of it anyway because last time he heard it, it hadn’t been so deep.

“Kitster?”

The man unwrapped himself to reveal a tanned face, dark hair, and bushy beard. He crossed the distance, and Anakin kept his hands cautiously raised but his stance firm. Just in case…

Upon inspecting his face closely for a moment or two, the man grinned.

“Ani!” he exclaimed and then grabbed him in a tight hug.

* * *

Anakin was more prepared for the news that Tatooine had officially broken out into civil war than he was for how easily his old friend welcomed him home and allowed him and Ahsoka into their camp a few kilometers away from his brother’s homestead. He was also unprepared for the presence of a few tuskens who the Tatooine Liberty Resistance had allied with, caught somewhere between cold hatred and white, hot fury and tired grief and guilt about what happened the last time he encountered the native people of Tatooine. But he didn’t have time to dwell on his past traumas. Right then, they had to worry about this war.

Apparently, Beru and Owen weren’t the only ones attacked and whisked away by Jabba’s people. Many of the free-people who aided in freeing slaves and smuggling them off-world had been captured in a coordinated attack to slow down, if not completely end, the revolution happening on the planet. That had been a week ago. Since then, lines had been drawn marking towns and settlements still in the grip of Jabba, his enforcers, and slavers and towns and settlements that were now completely free, the remaining slavers and scum run out and into Jabba’s territory.

It didn’t take long for Anakin to figure out that Jabba had a bigger goal. That Jabba had figured out that the Tatooine revolution had help beyond his borders. That his attack was an effort to draw the attention of whoever that outside help might be and possibly get them to come to Tatooine to investigate. Cutting people off from a way to flee if they wanted wouldn’t end the planet’s revolution. Heck, killing Anakin wouldn’t stop people from getting papers and being smuggled into the Republic. But it would slow things down and be a devastating blow to morale that would be hard to come back from.

“That seems like a huge leap,” Kitster pointed out as they conferred with some of the other leaders of the revolution on different settlements using the limited encrypted communication that they could safely use without Jabba’s people being able to tap in on the connection.

“It’s the reason that Jabba hasn’t dragged Beru, Owen, and everyone else he captured out for a public execution, either by his pet rancor or the sarlacc,” Anakin replied.

“Because otherwise, you wouldn’t have come if you found out it was too late to save them.”

Anakin huffed, batting away the temptations of the dark side as he said, “Oh, I would have come anyway.”

No one commented.

“So what now?”

Anakin smirked. “Finish springing the trap.”

His idea of springing the trap was simply walking up to Jabba’s front door, demanding he let the prisoners go, and seeing what happened from there.

Kitster and the other leaders didn’t like that idea.

“This may be our only chance to end Jabba’s rule.”

They suggested disguises. Anakin as a bounty hunter. Ahsoka as a gift for Jabba. Anakin shot that down, even though he sensed Ahsoka wasn’t opposed to the idea. There were too many ways an idea like that could go wrong. He’d wanted to fight tooth and nail against bringing her to Zygerria during the war. But he’d known it would be in vain and only gain him the ire of the Council, a lecture about emotions and attachment, and an angry teenage padawan who would have voiced her disgruntlement at him treating her like she was incapable. There were a thousand ways that mission could have gone wrong, and he’d still ended up with an irritated teenage padawan because he’d asked for days if she was okay and that nothing had happened. Which led to an argument that Obi-wan ended up having to mediate.

Regardless, there would be no disguising people as slaves. Besides, hutts had very long memories. Jabba probably remembered Ahsoka from the last mission they had to do with him.

“Well, we’ve got to do something. Otherwise, he’s probably going to blow you sky high by activating that minefield of his. And I know you’re a hotshot Jedi and all—”

“Former Jedi,” Anakin corrected.

Kitster ignored him and continued, “But even you can’t survive that.”

“Jabba doesn’t know you’re not a Jedi, though,” Ahsoka pointed out. “Even if he did, I am a Jedi.”

“What are you getting at?” Anakin asked.

“I mean, he’s probably looking for a reason to break his treaty with the Republic, right? Sure breaking it would mean the Republic’s under no obligation to send runaway slaves back into Hutt Territory. But it would also stop the Republic traffic that’s helped enable smuggling slaves out. The quickest way of breaking the treaty would be to have evidence that two actors for the Republic showed up at his doorstep to take his supposed property without cause. He can’t do that if he blows us up. He’d need proof to prevent the Republic from acting against him if he did break the treaty.”

“You’re assuming that the Senate would care enough about the use of the hyperspace lanes to do anything in response,” Anakin replied with a roll of his eyes.

“They would,” Ahsoka assured. “Not all of CIS planets surrendered back to the Republic. Some of them still have control over key hyperspace lanes into the Outer Rim. If Jabba backed out for no reason, the effect on trade would be enough to make the Senate vote to act against him, no matter how much Padmé tried to convince them otherwise. So Jabba needs us alive if this is to work to his benefit.”

“Or he could just blow us up anyway as is his right because of the treaty, and Padmé would rally the Senate to move against Jabba anyway, regardless of the fact he didn’t break the treaty, because it’s us,” Anakin replied pointedly.

Because while Padmé was all for peace and diplomatic solutions, she could have one hell of a mean streak when it came to personally avenging people she cared for. And with an army still in reserve, Anakin had no doubt she’d find a way to motivate the Senate to use it if something happened to Anakin and Ahsoka out here.

“Jabba doesn’t know that.”

That was also true.

“Where did you learn all this?” Anakin asked, impressed. Because it certainly hadn’t been from him.

Ahsoka groaned. “I was part of the envoy sent with some Republic senators to try to ease the tensions with those from the Separatists who refused to be forced back into the Republic. I was bored out of my mind, but I had to report back to the Council about it, so I paid as much attention as I could.”

“So,” Kitster interrupted. “What’s the plan?”

“The original plan. Walk up to Jabba’s front door, demand our people back, see what happens from there,” Anakin declared.

“Is this a typical Jedi thing?”

Ahsoka shrugged and answered, “In our lineage, it is.”

* * *

Showing up and putting a civil war that officially lasted a total of fourteen Tatooine days to an end made Anakin feel like he was Jedi Padawan again. On a mission with Obi-wan where all hell inevitably broke loose and the bare bones of the plan they had went to hell.

Anakin and Ahsoka walked up to Jabba’s front door, into his throne room, and demanded the prisoners back. Jabba had, predictably, laughed in their faces. Then they fought off a rancor, pissed Jabba off by killing the rancor, and had summarily been sentenced to be digested a thousand years in the sarlacc pit along with Beru, Owen, and the other prisoners. Seeing as Jabba hardly ever left his castle, the Tatooine resistance was able to use it as an opportunity to take out Jabba. And though their forces were meager and relatively untrained, with Jabba’s lack of cover and the help of a Jedi and a former Jedi, they were able to defeat Jabba, defeat or run off his mercenaries, and seize power over the planet. There was still Jabba’s wider, lingering influence in Hutt Space. But without Jabba to hold certain syndicates and the other clans together, Anakin was sure they’d fall apart in the next few months. At most, the next few years.

“How are you feeling?”

Anakin didn’t look up from the sands he so hated as Ahsoka came to sit next to him in front of Jabba’s seized palace. His people, as much as he denied it, milled about, looking to be gearing up for a party. The work of building some kind of working government to rule themselves would begin afterward.

“I don’t know,” Anakin replied.

Because in this whole fiasco reminding him of his padawan days, so too was Anakin reminded that being a Jedi hadn’t just been the three and a half years of the Clone Wars. While they’d gotten into their fair share of fights; while Anakin even then questioned the role of the Jedi as it pertained to the Republic and their job as peacekeepers in the galaxy; while Anakin lived for the missions where he got to engage in “aggressive negotiations; while the whole no attachments piece hadn’t made any sense to him; while nothing had been perfect, he’d always felt like the odd one out, and there were many things the Jedi could evolve in and improve on—there had been so many moments of grateful people who were better for and rejoiced because of their intervention. Just like the people of Tatooine were doing now.

He added, “I just wonder if I made the right choice.”

And for the first time that Anakin was conscious of, it wasn’t about whether or not he should have saved the Republic and the Jedi from the Sith.

Ahsoka had been subtly dropping hints for years that he should rethink his decision to leave the Jedi for good. Nothing particularly annoying. Just probing statements every blue moon. Like the fact that the Jedi were in desperate need of an advanced saber techniques instructor for the older initiates. Or that no one was quite as attentive to the droids as he’d been.

So Anakin wasn’t surprised when she said, “You were meant for this. I’d never seen you fight like that, fight so hard for something with your heart in it like that. It was the most alive I’ve ever seen you. You could keep doing this.”

“I… No. I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’ve hurt people with this power. I almost… I would have…”

He continued to look at the sand, avoiding Ahsoka’s penetrating gaze.

“You would have what?”

He’d never told anyone. He never wanted to tell anyone. But secrets caused his last relationship to crumble. Ahsoka had to know who and what she was dealing with. So he told her everything. Starting from murdering the Tusken tribe when they killed his mother, without thought for those among them who were innocent. To the more and more terrible things he did during the war, especially after she left. To killing Dooku when he was unarmed and unable to fight. And finally, the most damning of them all, to agreeing to become Sidious’ apprentice, even getting his Sith name, to prevent his dreams of Padmé dying in childbirth. Only to back out when he realized the Sith was probably lying to him. To killing Sidious and sitting in the office for hours trying to walk back from the dark side before he was found. To the days afterward, while in holding until the Senate could conduct an investigation into all Palpatine’s dealings, caught between being terrified of anyone finding out that he’d fallen and wondering if he should just continue Sidious’ work anyway. Because you didn’t come back from the dark side. That’s what he’d been taught at the Temple.

Ahsoka listened quietly, falling back on the Jedi stoicism and impassivity she’d been trained to portray. Anakin wasn’t sure if he was relieved by that or irritated, both wanting and not wanting to know her true feelings about what he was confessing to.

“I already knew,” Ahsoka whispered when he was done.

“Knew what?”

“I knew you had fallen.”

Anakin knew Ahsoka was startlingly observant, but she couldn’t be _that_ observant. She couldn’t have…

She added, “I sensed it.”

“I… wait. You knew all this time, and you never… you didn’t say anything?” Anakin managed.

“I didn’t want to believe Maul was right.”

“What does Maul have to do with any of this?”

And then she was confessing to him. The real reason Maul on was Mandalore. To lure Obi-wan there, knowing that Anakin wouldn’t be far behind, and to kill Palpatine’s future apprentice, the one Palpatine had painstakingly groomed over the course of his chancellorship and the war. To at least throw a huge spanner in the Sith Lord’s plan, if not completely thwart it. Ahsoka hadn’t believed him, was sure that he would never fall.

“And then I felt it,” Ahsoka said quietly with her arms wrapped around herself. “I heard you pledge yourself to him. I heard him name you Darth Vader.”

If Anakin hadn’t been convinced she knew all this time and thought she was just saying this to make him feel like he hadn’t really been hiding anything, her saying his given Sith name did it. Because even though he admitted to getting one, he hadn’t revealed to her what it was. That had been too much for him. He hardly even _thought_ the name. Kept it locked deep in his mind, behind tight mental shields where no one would ever be able to find it.

“I was terrified of what I’d find by the time we got back to Coruscant.”

Something that had never entirely made sense but that Anakin had never thought too hard on suddenly clicked.

“That’s why you didn’t contact me afterward.”

She didn’t answer. It wasn’t a question, anyway.

“I knew it came out that Palpatine was the Sith Lord, that he’d been playing both sides of the war to consolidate power, and that you killed him. But I wasn’t sure… After sensing you fall, I wasn’t sure what I was really going to find when I saw you.”

A quiet night a few months back when they were both up from nightmares came back to Anakin.

_I’m glad you’re here, Skyguy._

“That’s one of your nightmares.”

Ahsoka again didn’t answer. That hadn’t been a question either.

“Do you regret it?” she suddenly asked.

“Regret what?”

“The things you did. Everything that led to you agreeing to become a Sith. Do you regret it?”

“Yes.” He paused. Then, “I know under Tatooine law I didn’t do anything wrong with the Tuskens, but that didn’t make it right. Maybe just killed her captors but not the whole tribe. And it was war. I’m not sure if I hadn’t done some things that I would have survived it.” Because war was messy. And the only way to not go insane after having to make the hard choices, having to choose between treating the enemy humanely or saving the men under him, the people he was charged with protecting, the people he wanted to protect, was justifying the bad things in the name of a noble cause. The greater good… even though the greater good hadn’t turned out to be so great. “I wish I hadn’t had to do any of it. I wish there had been another way. I wish I’d tried harder to look for it.”

“You can do that then.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. But you’re the Chosen One. Maybe this is what it meant.”

Anakin scoffed. “Please. Don’t.”

Ahsoka laughed. “I know you hate it. But maybe, if it wasn’t a myth, it was about making all these mistakes and regretting them and then making sure no one else stumbled like you did. Maybe it was about remaking the Jedi Order all along so no one will feel cornered like you were. Not just defeating some ancient dark siders. Anyone skilled enough with a lightsaber can do that.”

“But I…”

“You know what the Council told me when I rejoined the Jedi?”

“What?”

“That it doesn’t matter that you left or that you lost your way. What matters is that you’re able to find your way back. They weren’t just talking about me or any individual Jedi, by the way.” Ahsoka grabbed his hand. “You made the right choice for the right time for you. And now, you want to go back. I think if you do, you can make sure others don’t lose their way. And if they do, you can help them find a way back too.”

* * *

It took a few months for Anakin to work up the courage and talk himself into going before the Jedi Council. When he did, he didn’t tell Obi-wan in advance to give his old master the chance to help smooth the way for him. He didn’t even tell Ahsoka that he’d finally requested an audience even though she was the one who helped him figure it out in the end. He waited for her to be off-planet for a mission. This was something Anakin had to do on his own. Something he had to face on his own. Just like he ran away on his own.

For the first time, he was completely forthright with the Council. About all the things he’d done, withheld from them, and outright lied about. Ending with how he had taken up Sidious on his offer to become a Sith and fallen to the dark side—no matter how brief the time had been or how quickly he’d been able to see through Palpatine’s lies and back away from it.

“I know I’ve done terrible things. I know I lied about them and then ran away to escape the consequences. I’ll take whatever punishment you give me if that’s what you decide. It’s probably what I deserve,” Anakin said, not quite able to meet the eyes of any of the Council sitting around him. He was frankly relieved they hadn’t already called the Temple guards to apprehend him yet. “But I know the good the Jedi can do for the galaxy. I know the Jedi can be as revered and admired as they once were. More than they once were. I know it won’t be easy, and we’re not going to always agree. But I want to be part of helping with that. Paving the way forward for change and growth. If you’ll have me again. Despite everything.”

Anakin expected them to deliberate for weeks. Maybe even months. He had flagrantly broken most of their rules, not even just the one about attachment. He almost became the man that would have seen to their destruction. But to his surprise, they called him back the next day, to stop in on his way to gather the twins from their classes. At the very least, Anakin was sure that meant they weren’t going to arrest him and place him in holding. But he didn’t allow himself to be relieved by that yet.

They were silent for a while after they let him in, exchanging glances and cues. The faces were different, but Anakin felt like he was the little boy standing before them being judged eighteen years ago. Except this time, he deserved every ounce of their judgment. The only thing that slightly comforted him but also confused him was the pride he felt coming off of Obi-wan. His old master wasn’t even bothering trying to hide it. He was practically projecting it.

“Terrible trials you have undergone, young Skywalker,” Master Yoda finally began. Shaking his head, he continued, “Terrible trials. Given into many temptations, you did, culminating in becoming a servant of the dark, no matter how brief.”

“Yes, Master,” Anakin said. Humility didn’t come easy to him, but he mustered all the humility he had in that moment, terrified as he was. He would not fall back on old habits and give in to his anger, give into his shame. Otherwise, his confession to the Council would have meant nothing.

“And yet,” Yoda continued. “Overcame them in the end, you did. A better man for it, you have become.

Anakin waited for the other shoe to drop. He wasn’t surprised.

“A better Jedi for it, also,” Shaak Ti said.

Anakin resisted the urge to sigh. He shouldn’t have been surprised. He knew—Wait.

A better _Jedi_.

“Not despite your shortcomings and failings, but because of them,” added Depa Billaba.

Anakin couldn’t help remembering that he had helped Palpatine murder her master in that office five years ago. He didn’t deserve their mercy. He certainly didn’t deserve to be a Jedi again. But he wanted it.

He wanted it so much.

“We hereby reinstate you as a member of the Order, granting you all rights and privileges associated and granted by your status.”

Anakin felt like he was floating. Like he was in a dream. He’d hoped they might take him back. But he hadn’t held his breath. Had been prepared for them to turn him away. Wouldn’t have blamed them. Would have accepted their decision and simply been grateful they hadn’t apprehended him. Gone back home to be with his kids, Ahsoka. Started thinking about how he could help Tatooine as they began a new government and began to negotiate their own treaty with the Republic for use of the hyperspace lanes now under their control. Started making plans to help the broader Liberty Resistance from his government job now that Tatooine was freed from their overseer.

But it would have gnawed at him if he hadn’t tried. If he didn’t know for certain whether or not they’d take him back. And then, shock of all shocks, they had. Anakin wasn’t sure he’d been so thrilled about something in a long time. Nothing could top this moment of triumph.

Then Obi-wan said with a proud smile, “ _Master Skywalker.”_

* * *

It starts like this.

Anakin Skywalker fell to the dark side, became Darth Vader, and immediately betrayed his Sith Master. He ended the Clone War, saved the Republic, walked away from the Jedi, and kept his sins secret. He spent nearly five years lost and trying to find himself and his way before rejoining the Jedi Order. This time on his own terms.

Luke and Leia were the first children to be enrolled full-time in Jedi training while still under the custody and care of both their parents. The first, but they wouldn’t be the last once the Order worked out the kinks of extending such an offer to other families. Once they worked out how they would teach their code and what no attachment actually meant. If they didn’t just toss it out the airlock, Anakin mused once.

Anakin was pretty sure that eventually, he was going to ask Ahsoka to marry him. That was going to stir some controversy and ignite many discussions in the Order for sure. But Anakin promised he would help pave the way forward for change, and getting married would help with that. Not to mention it wasn’t like they hadn’t known about his and Ahsoka’s relationship when they reinstated him _and_ made him a master. But that was going to be a little ways off. She loved him and the playing stepmother to the twins when it was his turn to have them, but Anakin didn’t think Ahsoka was ready for or wanted something like marriage yet…

Until Ahsoka randomly started wondering about and looking into what traditional Jedi weddings used to look like before the great Sith Wars a thousand years ago. Anakin knew how to take a hint (sometimes). He made a mental note to have lunch with Padmé soon. She’d have some ideas on how he should go about a proposal if Ahsoka hadn’t already flat out told her how she wanted it to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) This was originally not the story of how Anakin left the Jedi and found his way back on his own terms. He was originally supposed to stay away. Supposed to struggle to manage his anger. But as I wrote it, I realized the story wasn’t taking me in that direction, and I ended up… with this ending somehow. I’ve learned to just go with the flow of my stories.
> 
> 2) War changes a lot of things. No institution affected by it remained unchanged after all is said and done. I am of the firm belief that if the Jedi had survived the war, they would not have remained unchanged from it, particularly as participants in it. I think after all that war and destruction, many Jedi would have had crises of faith and just, in general, realized that some parts of the Jedi philosophy as interpreted make absolutely no sense (heck, they don’t even know what the no attachment rule means or even where the hell it comes from because it’s not from any iteration of their code). I think without change, many Jedi would have walked out, especially after THE Jedi, no matter how unorthodox he was, walked out after killing the Sith. At least, it would look that way.
> 
> By the time I was done with this piece, I thought about Mineko Iwasaki, who was a geisha and closed her geisha house at the height of her career in protest because of that world’s refusal to change. She thought it would inspire change. Instead, many more geisha houses followed suit. In this story, the Jedi take the hint. Realistically, I think the Jedi would have died out naturally, and eventually, some new light side of the Force philosophy and galactic guardians would have risen from the ashes.
> 
> Okay. That’s really all I have to say. As always, I’m open to questions about the story and some of my thought processes about star wars philosophy and world building. I hope you enjoyed this experiment. Thanks for all the kudos and comments and bookmarks. Continue to do so. I appreciate it. Until next time (this time, it will be You’re Cordially Invited), Lady Dae, out.


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